Paytm to revamp senior leadership, with key hires upcoming: Vijay Shekhar Sharma

Paytm is expanding its senior leadership team and plans to make key appointments in the coming quarters, Vijay Shekhar Sharma, CEO of the parent company, revealed at the annual general meeting on Thursday.

"In recent days, we have not only added key team members but are also expanding our senior leadership in areas that are core to our payments and financial services business," Sharma said during the meeting.

Paytm has seen several high-level exits in the recent past amid ongoing restructuring efforts and challenges stemming from regulatory actions.

In May, then-President and Chief Operating Officer Bhavesh Gupta announced he would take a career break and transition to an advisory role. Gupta had been promoted to president and COO in May of the previous year.

Around the same time, Ajay Vikram Singh, Chief Business Officer (CBO) of the UPI and User Growth vertical, and Bipin Kaul, CBO of Offline Payments, also stepped down from their roles at the digital payments major.

In May, Sumit Mathur, who had served as Chief Marketing Officer for over a year, left to join Glanbia Performance Nutrition as its Country Head for India and South Asia.

His exit followed that of Praveen Sharma, a senior vice president who resigned after four years at the company.

Other notable departures include Surinder Chawla, the Managing Director and CEO of Paytm Payments Bank, as well as independent directors Manju Agarwal and Shinjini Kumar.

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These resignations followed a major regulatory setback in January when the Reserve Bank of India barred Paytm Payments Bank from accepting deposits or reloading customer accounts and wallets.

“The past six months have taught us many lessons, allowing us to thoroughly examine our business processes, compliance, and internal operations. I can now confidently say that we have adopted a compliance-first approach, ensuring our business adheres fully to all regulations, both in letter and spirit,” Sharma assured attendees at the AGM.

Despite the exits, Paytm has made some significant hires to strengthen its leadership team.

Recently, Paytm appointed Narasinganallore Venkatesh Srinivasan as a Non-Executive Independent Director. Srinivasan previously served as the Chief Executive Officer at the Association of Mutual Funds in India (AMFI).

Before his role at AMFI, he was the Chief Financial Officer and an Executive Director on the board of Lakshmi Vilas Bank. Srinivasan also spent 19 years with IDBI Bank, where he held senior roles, including Chief Financial Officer and Executive Director.

Rakesh Singh is now the new Chief Executive Officer of Paytm Money Ltd. Singh previously held the role of CEO at Fisdom, a stockbroking firm, and brings experience from ICICI Securities and Standard Chartered Bank.

In addition, Varun Sridhar, who was leading Paytm Money, has transitioned to become the Chief Executive Officer of Paytm Services Pvt Ltd. Arun Kumar Bansal has also joined as the Managing Director and CEO of Paytm Payments Bank, coming from IDBI Bank, where he was the Executive Director and Head of Treasury.