Every few weeks brings a new major employer that, thanks to Advanto, lets its employees withdraw their earnings whenever they want. The startup Advanto is thus continuing the dynamic growth that has defined its past year.
Since the start of this year alone, almost 10,000 working people have gained access to the Advanto app. This means they no longer have to wait for the standard monthly payday, but can transfer their pay to their account in parts, according to their own judgment and needs.
“We're delighted with how the first quarter of this year turned out. We introduced Advanto at companies such as Batist Medical, the perfumery chain Notino, and the Bageterie Boulevard restaurant chain. We also entered the automotive industry, bringing us closer to our goal of becoming the market standard within three years,” says Advanto founder and CEO Martin Fortelný.
A shortage of materials, components, and people is changing the approach to paying wages
Among manufacturers of parts for the automotive industry, three companies have already introduced Advanto for their employees: the domestic plants belonging to the Japanese companies Fuji Koyo and Koito, and the German company Grammer. The startup is in talks with further manufacturers and expects to close partnerships with up to 10 more employers in this manufacturing segment during the second quarter.
“This is clearly a trend linked to the turbulent times the automotive sector and its workers are experiencing,” Fortelný comments, adding that, nevertheless, the main reason the vast majority of companies introduce earned wage access is to support recruitment, and, for existing employees, to help bridge the period of accelerating inflation.
This is confirmed by Martin Kuržeja, HR manager at Grammer: “Above all, we want to prevent employees from ending up in debt enforcement proceedings because they have to borrow from various non-bank institutions at high interest rates, for example when their washing machine breaks down. We hope that by refreshing our range of attractive benefits, Advanto will help us retain existing employees and attract new ones,” he explains.
Lenka Kubánková, HR manager at Fuji Koyo Czech, adds that employees themselves had already started showing interest in more frequent wage payments several years ago. “Our system only allowed one advance to be withdrawn per month because of the administrative burden. When we learned about Advanto, which handles all of that for us, the decision was quick,” says Kubánková. Once connected to a company's payroll and attendance systems, Advanto operates in a fully automated way, and the startup currently funds the money that people send themselves through the app from its own resources on behalf of employers. So even if all employees were to withdraw pay every single day, nothing would change for employers using Advanto — they simply settle up with Advanto at the end of the month.
Advanto has had a successful year behind it, and an even more successful one ahead
The popularity of earned wage access is by no means limited to manufacturing, however. In February, Advanto also entered into a partnership with Crocodille, which operates the Bageterie Boulevard and Pizza 360 restaurant chains.
“We are currently in advanced talks with hundreds of other employers who have been won over by the benefits of introducing earned wage access,” says Fortelný.
According to Fortelný, one of this year's milestones will be expansion into Slovakia, where some of the companies that already offer Advanto in the Czech Republic also operate. “Our partners are telling us they want to offer Advanto to their employees in Slovakia too, and we want to make that possible for them this year. But we're already preparing to expand into other countries as well,” says Fortelný, adding that he also wants to expand the app this year with a new, socially responsible financial service.
Fortelný founded Advanto together with Jan Kölbl at the start of 2020, and the pair quickly became pioneers in providing earned wage access solutions. Last year, it was adopted by companies such as Lagardère (Burger King, Costa Coffee, Relay), Delivery Hero (Dáme Jídlo), Srovnejto, Rohlík, and others. Hand in hand with this, the number of Advanto app users kept growing month after month: over the course of 2021, it multiplied sevenfold in total. As a result, monthly revenue for the past year even increased fortyfold.
