After growing its U.S. team by over 75 percent to more than 600 employees this year, London-based Wise is announcing an ambitious plan to hire another 250 U.S. employees in 2023.
Wise, which first opened its NYC office in 2015, currently has 53 employees at its office in the Flatiron District. While the bulk of Wise’s U.S. growth push will be directed toward its operational hub in Tampa and its full-stack tech office in Austin, Wise does plan to hire about 19 employees in NYC in the coming year.
Wise, previously known as TransferWise, is a fintech company that can execute international money transfers eight times cheaper than a bank, according to its website. Half of its international transfers are executed in less than 20 seconds, while traditional banks take between three and five days. Wise users can hold more than 50 currencies in their digital wallet.
Balazs Barna, Wise’s head of U.S. engineering, told Built In the company is growing its U.S. team to meet increasing demand from U.S. consumers and businesses. Wise said it generated more than $104 million in North American revenue in the past six months, which is a 58 percent increase compared to the same period last year.
In addition to its growth among individual consumers, Barna said the company has seen strong interest from small and medium-sized businesses in the U.S. that don’t have access to the same banking services as larger corporations.
“When you sign up for Wise as a small and medium-sized business, you are just as important to us as a large corporation,” Barna said. “When businesses get access to this new technology, and they can see that it takes 20 seconds to send it over to the other side of the world, it helps them build their brand and their reputation.”
Globally, Wise’s workforce has grown 49 percent in the past year to 4,300 employees across 18 offices. Wise has been profitable since 2017, Barna said, so the company has proven it is capable of sustainable growth.
“We’ve spent the last decade building a sustainable, profitable business model, and we look forward to welcoming new team members to help us build the best way for our U.S.-based customers to move money around the world,” Wise CTO Harsh Sinha said in a statement.
