Exclusive: Oyster launches new products on back of PayPal investment
Oyster is a one stop shop for hiring and managing distributed teams.
Why You Should Care
Hiring from anywhere has come into its own during the pandemic.
HR tech startup Oyster is reaping the benefits in investment, and therefore launching a few new features.
Check out its newest equity feature in this UNLEASH exclusive.
The pandemic and the resulting shift to remote working has really transformed how companies see the talent pool.
As organizations and individuals have proven that productivity is not linked with working from an office, there is no longer any need for organizations for focus their hiring practices on locations that are commutable to their office.
Therefore, COVID-19 has accelerated the already emerging hiring from anywhere and distributed teams trend.
As a result, it is not surprising that tech startups that support companies to do this compliantly, like Oyster, are attracting significant investment and customer interest.
In June, Oyster’s HR platform for distributed teams across more than 180 countries raised $50 million in a Series B led by Stripes, and now it has attracted further investment from PayPal Ventures and Indeed affiliate HR Tech Investments.
Talking about the investment, PayPal Ventures director Ashish Aggarwal commented: “We share Oyster’s vision of a future where everyone can participate in the global economy.
“We are excited to be investing at such an important moment for the company — and are looking forward to working with the Oyster team as they use their innovative platform to support companies around the world in benefiting from a distributed workforce.”
At the same time as announcing this latest investment, Oyster has exclusively shared with UNLEASH a new feature that enables it to support companies seeking to provide stock and equity as benefits compliantly on a global scale.
The new Equity Assessment Tool will allow Oyster to help companies to decide how, when and what type of equity offerings would work for their distributed teams in order to drive retention and attraction in the current labor market marked by the ‘Great Resignation’.
It provides a color-coded rating of countries across the world – green is where equity is a low-risk compensation option, amber is where there is complexity and there might be the need to consult legal consultancy before implementing this benefit, while red is where it is unadvisable to offer equity.
Talking about the new offering, Oyster’s interim head of people Kim Rohrer commented: “Offering equity can be a powerful way of attracting and retaining team members.
“But in the new world of distributed work, providing incentives like stock options and RSUs [restricted stock units] can be deeply complicated. Each country has its own tax, legal, and compliance requirements, meaning that the risks and costs of providing equity can vary dramatically by location.
“That’s why I’m so excited about Oyster’s Equity Assessment Tool — it will help companies understand the implications of providing equity in certain countries, and in doing so, will give them more confidence when designing compensation packages for team members all over the world.”
In addition, Oyster recently launched its new ‘Oyster for Impact’ program that gives non-profits and benefit corporations globally a discount on Oyster products.
Tony Jamous, CEO and co-founder of Oyster.
Oyster co-founder and CEO Tony Jamous noted that this fits with Oyster’s vision is “a future of equal opportunities for everyone, everywhere”.
He added: “In keeping with that vision, we are excited to deepen our work with other mission-driven companies through ‘Oyster for Impact.’ We hope that the membership benefits we’ve announced today will go a long way towards helping more non-profits and benefit corporations unlock the commercial, environmental, and societal advantages of distributed work.”
