Paytm to cut losses by 33% to $400 million: Vijay Shekhar Sharma

Bengaluru: India’s most valued startup at over $10 billion, Paytm, has begun talking of improving margins as loss-making private internet companies across the world come under pressure after office-sharing startup WeWork’s failed public offering.

Paytm CEO Vijay Shekhar Sharma told TOI in an interview that the company will bring down its ebitda (earnings before interest, taxes, debt, and amortisation) losses by at least a third to $350-400 million (Rs 2,470-2,823 crore) in this financial year. The mobile payments and commerce major’s ebitda losses had tripled to $600 million (Rs 4,218 crore) in FY19. Ebitda is a measure of a company’s operating performance.

The company has cut down marketing spends on incentivising peer-to-peer transactions (P2P) in the payments business while completing heavy investment cycle in digital commerce businesses like movie and travel ticketing as they have “matured”.