Pratyush Prasanna is the Group CEO of Flip.id, Indonesia's leading fintech company. With a proven track record in payments, he previously spearheaded merchant solutions at GoTo Financial and held key leadership positions at Poynt and Paytm. In his free time, Pratyush enjoys hitting the open road on his motorcycle.

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👋🏼 How would you explain your job to someone outside tech?

‍Fintech and Payments are evolving fast today. My job is to work with our world class team to ensure our  customers get the best Fintech experience at par with the world.

At Flip, we also ensure the services are always fair—which means the best rates across the industry for the best services.

As CEO, I ensure the product team is building the right product on time, the sales and marketing teams send the right message to our partners and customers and the operations teams deliver the best support experience.

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🧐 What's something about you or your job that would surprise us?

‍Most of my work is actually dealing with people.

I think managing people is the greatest skill a CEO can have—setting the right goals, providing motivation, mentorship and guidance are actually activities that take most of my time and I find the most rewarding.  

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🏆 What has been the biggest highlight of your career so far?

‍I was fortunate to be at Paytm during the massive growth phase. It was a great experience bringing relevant Finance products to the customer and seeing the adoption.

I have since used those experiences and learnings in my career in the USA, India, Indonesia

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🔍 What's a startup trend or space you're watching this year?‍

Monetization—the last few years have made everyone focus on monetization and I think we have crossed beyond the years of reckless spending for user acquisition.

It would be interesting to see how companies (especially Fintechs) chart this journey of monetization. I am also a keen observer of AI tech—but have the opinion that the technology needs to evolve.

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💼 What advice would you give someone starting out in your industry?

Always remember that you build something for a customer—therefore customer first should always be the mantra. Please DO NOT start anything with a view of making money.

If you solve a genuine user problem, money will always come. However if you are not solving a genuine issue or providing a significant value, it is going to be a difficult journey.

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🗣 What's one thing you can keep talking about for hours?

Politics

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🎥 What's your favorite movie/TV show?

Game of Thrones, Shogun, The Expanse (coincidentally one of Jeff Bezos' favorites)

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🍨 What's your go-to ice cream flavor?‍

Chocolate—always chocolate.

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FYI. We've edited this interview for clarity.