Meet Ahmed Karsli, founder of Papara
I’m Ahmed Karslı, founder and CEO of Papara, Turkey’s largest challenger bank. I have been a serial entrepreneur since I was 17, selling my first company for over $1M at 19. I’ve built numerous companies in different sectors, and prior founding Papara, also served as a lawyer.
What inspired you to launch your business and what is the end goal?
I founded Papara with the goal of providing financial inclusion and freedom for all, first in Turkey and then wider. According to the World Bank, there are currently 1.6 billion ‘unbanked’ people globally. In Turkey, 31% of the population are classed as being unbanked, so access to financial services is a real issue that needed solving.
Many people are underserved by the current system: traditional banks are unable, and in some cases unwilling, to adapt to the needs of certain customers - primarily those who are low income, lack the documentation typically required to open a bank account and tend to live in more remote locations. We wanted to combat this and make sure these otherwise ignored customer segments were catered for. It’s my view that fintechs such as Papara have a unique ability to democratise the financial system and make it more of a level playing field.
What are your responsibilities as a business owner?
As CEO and owner of the business, I am responsible for ensuring Papara’s continued success, both commercially and in terms of fulfilling our founding mission. I believe the leader of any business determines its culture, so I’m committed to ensuring we foster an environment of innovation, inclusivity and trust. It’s hugely important to me to ensure we continue to have a collegial work environment where everyone is encouraged to participate the decision making process, empowered to raise their voices, drive change and be heard.
How do you set yourself apart from other businesses in your industry?
Unlike similar players in the market, Papara has been profitable since day one and continues to grow at a rapid pace, all without any external investment. Compared to our competitors, we’ve also spent very little on marketing, despite having grown to 10 million users. This cash-generative model means we are able to offer our services at no cost for the vast majority of our users.
Our breadth of products set us apart, from our free currency conversions to bill payments, mass payments and check-out services. Indeed, on average, we launch new features every two weeks. We continue to disrupt the traditional market by offering agile and instant services around the clock and at no extra cost.
What’s more, we recognise there are a range of barriers in the financial system which many find difficult to overcome. The first of these is language – often the jargon-heavy tone many traditional providers adopt can be unappealing to customers at their first point of contact, and therefore counteractive to their goals. At Papara, we place a great emphasis on making our communications with customers efficient, accessible and user-friendly, which ultimately provides them with the best outcomes.
What plans do you have for your business over the next two years?
In the next two years, we have ambitious goals to maintain the momentum around our rapid growth. As outlined above, we’re achieving this by continuing to develop and introduce world-class products for our users in order to become a financial super-app and one-stop-shop for their specific needs.
Alongside this, we’re looking to expand our operations across Europe: currently, we’re applying for an e-money licence in Lithuania, our first point of expansion. Germany, which four million Turks call home will naturally be the next country in which we look to expand, shortly followed by France, Belgium, Austria and Switzerland.
How important is company culture and what is your top tip to get it right?
Since October last year, we’ve more than doubled our headcount in the last 12 months, and that growth will continue into 2022. As we scale, we want to ensure our culture evolves at the same time. We’re committed to maintaining a high-performance environment, attracting the best talent who are working to the same goal of financial inclusion for all. At Papara, everyone is committed to the same common goal and gives their best day in, day out – our rapid growth is proof of that.
Does your company help the community that you’re located in?
Absolutely – we build out our products with our core mission in mind. Over the last 5 years, Papara has allowed millions of people to become part of the financial system – often for the first time – granting them the ability to manage their money for free, at any time of day. Unlike traditional banks, we use the Robin Hood pricing model, only monetising our top 10% of users. By democratising finance in this way, we’ve given financial freedom to a wider range of people.
With our core mission in mind at the beginning of the pandemic we established a donate feature on our App. This allowed our customers to make donations to the pandemic relief efforts, which went to those who were truly in need. More recently, with the forest fires impacting millions of people across the country, we made significant donations as a company. On a personal level, I worked part-time to help fight the fires, so I saw first-hand the help that was needed on the ground. We’ve also donated to both causes as a business and will continue to work with causes that matter.
How does technological advancement speak to the strategic direction of your business?
With technological efficiencies at their core, and unconstrained by the legacy systems traditional banks were built on, the pandemic has been a defining moment for neobanks. From first-hand experience, our customers have valued the speed and ease with which we have been able to adapt to their quickly changing needs in comparison to incumbent providers, which we believe has been the key catalyst for our growth. However, as we emerge from the Covid-19 crisis with more digitally evolved consumer habits, there will be a turning point for the sector whereby challenger banks will in fact form the majority of the banking industry.
There is a world of opportunity within technology, and we will always ensure we are at the cutting edge of it.
What are your top three tips to hire and develop new talent?
For me, the most important asset of a company is by far is its employees. The team is the driving force of the business and therefore absolutely central to our overall performance. As such, we want to foster an inclusive and high-performance environment that develops alongside our rapid growth trajectory. My top tips to other business owners wanting to hire and develop new talent are:
Flexibility – our team has valued the shift to hybrid working, so we’ve listened, and will maintain this model moving forward. We’ve found that implementing this flexibility has been a big draw factor for recent new joiners.
Offer staff a future career, not just a job – with so much uncertainty in recent years, we recognise that more than ever before, people really value job security. Alongside that, there needs to be internal support and development opportunities, so that employees can see a visible pathway for their future in your company.
Equality, diversity and inclusion – no longer just buzzwords, these three elements are absolutely integral to any business. Developing new talent is not possible without first ensuring that workers feel valued and have the same access to opportunities, so implementing this from day one should be a key focus.
What advice would you give someone looking to enter the fintech industry as an entrepreneur?
It’s important not to rely on other channel partners, regulators, or other companies’ technology. Whilst it may speed up time to get to market in the short-run, it’s an unsustainable approach in the long-term. If you’re not producing your own technology, you are effectively positioning yourself as an operations start-up, bound to a third-party’s tech, making it extremely difficult to grow beyond a certain point. Lastly – one piece of advice I would give anyone looking to start in the industry – is to always have more than one backup plan in place.
How is digitisation empowering your business?
The demand for digital services has skyrocketed as a result of the pandemic, to unprecedented levels higher than most companies can meet. Big corporates are under pressure to digitalise their processes, but they are currently not able to do so at a rate that outpaces demand, especially when compared to disruptive start-ups. As such, digitisation – which has always been at the core of Papara – continues to empower our business day in, day out.
