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Vijay Shekhar Sharma
Paytm · Aligarh, UP
Son of a school teacher from Aligarh. Couldn't speak English in his first IIT-equivalent classes. Built the company that gave India digital payments.
English-isn't-requiredComeback-by-defaultPublic-market grit
Company
Paytm
Journey
Moves that mattered.
- 2000Built One97 — a content company for telcos. Nearly went bankrupt.
- 2010Pivoted to Paytm — mobile wallet before anyone wanted one.
- 2016Demonetisation: Paytm became a verb overnight.
- 2021India's biggest tech IPO. Then 4 years of brutal listing.
Struggles
₹8 lakh in debt before Paytm. Slept in office. Post-IPO crash erased most of his paper wealth — kept building anyway.
Family
Father a teacher; mother a homemaker. Married. Two children.
Related on Empire
Keep reading inside Empire.
Around the web
External references & backlinks.
- ↗wikipedia.orgVijay Shekhar Sharma on Wikipedia
- ↗google.comPaytm — official site
- ↗news.google.comVijay Shekhar Sharma in the news
- ↗crunchbase.comPaytm on Crunchbase
External links open in a new tab. Empire is not affiliated with these publishers.
The full story
Vijay Shekhar Sharma, in 1 chapters.
- Ch 01
The story
Son of a school teacher from Aligarh. Couldn't speak English in his first IIT-equivalent classes. Built the company that gave India digital payments.
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