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From a girl who only wants to ‘make a salary’ to the founder of a billion-dollar company at the age of 34

Suneera Madhani, 34, is a co-founder and Stax. Photo: Stax

Payments startup Stax may be one of the “strange” unicorns in the US startup world. The Orlando-based payments company is located more than 4,000 kilometers from Silicon Valley’s tech incubators. And it’s a multi-billion dollar startup run by one woman – 34-year-old co-founder and CEO Suneera Madhani, the daughter of two Pakistani immigrants. The startup was born in the context of only a small percentage of venture capital funds backing founders who are women and people of color.

Madhani and her brother Sal Rehmetullah (now the company’s president), started Stax in 2014 as a platform that pays businesses for a fixed monthly cost instead of a percentage of sales. Currently, the company’s staff is 300 people with transaction processing volume for thousands of businesses worth more than $23 billion over the past 8 years.

However, Stax also had a lot of difficulties in the beginning and Madhani wanted to encourage other women like her to make breakthroughs in her career.

“I was hesitant about becoming an entrepreneur,” Madhani told CNBC Make It. “I was the last to bet on myself. And I think that’s the case with a lot of women.”


“I just want to… work for a company that believes in me”

Growing up, Madhani witnessed firsthand the difficulties of running a company. Her parents run many businesses, from convenience stores to coffee shops, and she has previously talked about how most of those ventures fail.

After studying finance at the University of Florida, the self-described “data nerd” worked for a third-party affiliate of Atlanta-based payment processing company First Data, selling devices. terminal for payment to business owners. Her parents’ business experience gave her an idea: Some companies may prefer fixed costs as a percentage of sales. Depending on the client, her boss may also make more money.

Madhani presented the idea to his bosses and it was not approved. She then introduced to about 12 different banks and operators but all declined. Ignoring the idea is probably a better option than starting a business on your own.

“I just wanted to be a part of the process and work for a company that believed in me.”

She quickly found her way through dinner with her parents in Orlando, and recalls her father answering some stern questions: “Why are you trying to pitch this idea to everyone? Why do you need anyone?”

“I’m glad we persevered”

Madhani’s parents advised her to take 6 months to see if her start-up was viable. And her brother, a former Deloitte consultant who works in Silicon Valley for a software startup called Anaplan, is also waiting for this.

So, after building a basic payments platform and signing it up with Visa and MasterCard, Madhani drove around Orlando in his Volkswagen Beetle, pitching his company to startups and businesses other small. In the end, she signed with about 100 clients – and won numerous local startup competitions, earning a total prize pool of around $200,000.

Over the next two years, the company raised $2.25 million from Orlando-based VenVelo venture fund. A short time later, a larger competitor called, offering to buy Stax for $17.5 million.

Madhani’s investors are adamant that she should sell Stax. Instead, Madhani viewed the buyout offer as confirmation that he was on the right track. At this point, the company only has enough money to cover another 4 months’ salary. However, Madhani and his brother also rejected the deal – instead taking out a loan of $500,000 to keep the operation going.

Six months later, the company received a $5.5 million investment from Atlanta-based Fulcrum. To date, the total Stax has raised is more than $263 million and reached a multi-billion dollar valuation in March. (According to a Stax spokesperson, the company “has a viable way to make a profit.” profit”, but is currently focusing on development with a view to a future IPO).

“I’m glad we persevered,” Madhani said of the 2017 takeover offer. “I look back at my 26 years old and I wonder ‘Why didn’t I think it was possible?’ I wanted to say to her (Madhani at age 26) that, “You are going to do great things. Just do it”.

Of course, Madhani cannot go back to the past. But she can mentor other young women — which is why she launched a podcast and mentoring course for female entrepreneurs called CEO School in 2020.

Her lessons include pitching startup ideas and figuring out pricing models to maximize profits and learning how to be an effective leader. According to Madhani, the top lesson she wants to share: Stop trying to be someone you’re not.

“I’m not the traditional CEO you think I am, and I’m tired of trying to be the person everyone thinks I’m right for,” she said. ″There was a time when I tried to fit in this fintech world, tried to fit into the men’s club, until I realized I was not a man in a skirt. I need to validate what kind of CEO I am.”

Madhani said that in her 20s, she rarely sees other women working in fintech — let alone CEOs or startup founders. According to Madhani, she may be a “lonely” female entrepreneur in the technology industry, where less than a third of them are women and very few female leaders.


According to Tan Dat

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