Lahore-based HR and payroll startup Paismo has raised $1.3 million in a seed round led by Indus Valley Capital. The ‘oversubscribed’ round was also joined by Antler and Jedar Capital and takes the startup’s total funding to date to $1.5 million.
Founded in 2022 by Rebecka Zavaleta and Usama Mahmud, Paismo is building what it calls a modern HR & payroll software that’s easy, affordable, and customizable. Its software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform enables organizations to manage their talent and payroll with localized features designed from the ground up for different sizes of businesses in Pakistan.
The platform comes with a feature of timesheet management, allowing organizations to manage timesheets and schedules for their employees and automatically feeding them into the payroll. The feature can be integrated with the attendance or time device which effectively helps HR save tens of manhours that are normally spent on collecting data from these machines and manually making the adjustments in payroll based on it. Paismo’s cloud-based software also offers insights and reports to organizations to make HR decisions easier for them.
The founders are alumni of the University of Pennsylvania. Rebecka has a product background and has previously worked at companies like Google, TikTok and Facebook. Usama has experience in driving large-scale public sector reform programs for the education sector in Pakistan.
After engaging with hundreds of companies on ground, the Paismo team deeply understands the challenges companies face in building businesses, as well as growing and retaining talent. Hiring is difficult, delivering payroll is painful, employees hardly have access to benefits, and business performance is suboptimal,” notes a statement by Paismo, adding that it is building its software to solve these challenges.
Rebecka Zavaleta, the co-founder and CEO of Paismo, speaking about the platform said that it’s just not another software, “It is a product-led company, providing a customizable, user-centric solution, and actively integrating with strategic partners to foster access to benefits. We’re passionate about delivering a wholistic experience to our clients.”
The startup is currently focused on Pakistan but also has plans to potentially expand into MENA and SEA regions.
Aatif Awan, founder of Indus Valley Capital, said, “I saw firsthand at LinkedIn how software can create economic opportunity globally. With Paismo, we are excited about the opportunity to build an incredible ‘Made in Pakistan, for the World’ SaaS product to solve a huge problem for employers and employees across the emerging markets.”
Paismo currently offers three plans; basic, premium, and enterprise. Unfortunately, it doesn’t have any pricing details on its website.
It has recently also signed partnerships with leading Adamjee Insurance, the largest general insurance company of Pakistan, and MCB Islamic Bank, a top local bank, to enable its clients to provide insurance and financial benefits to their employees.
