SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders
1664 Travel Expense App Hits 6500 Customers, but ARPU data makes no sense
13 Feb 2020
Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
In 2015, he got involved with Sodeco. And then in 2018, spun out Raidu, a company, again, focused on a very specific vertical that the overall company was focused on. Obviously, the overall company is a publicly traded company. Raidu is focused on travel and expense management. Now serving out 6,500 customers, less than 3% annual revenue turn as they look to scale with their team of 300,000.
Hello, everyone. My guest today is Sebastian Marchand. He's an MBA. He earned his MBA in France, started his career in 2000 in the consulting industry, and then moved to the corporate travel industry in 2005. Then was hired by Sodeco in 2015 to create a new business line targeting the mobility services.
He created and launched his current company, Raidu, in June 2018 to play in the travel and expense management space. Sebastian, are you ready to take us to the top? Yes, I am. All right. So what is Raidu and what's the business model? How do you make money? Yeah, sure.
So Raidu is a B2B application that, let's say, dramatically simplifies the way companies and employees manage their travel and expenses. We actually offer two different modules. One is a travel booking module. So you can have access to thousands, well, millions of rates, fares, hotels, airlines, car rental companies, train.
And on top of accessing all these negotiated fares and rates, you don't have to pay for it. I mean, there is a central payment system. So for the travelers, you don't have to pay for it. You can just leave your hotel and the payment will be done by your company at the end of the month, to which we will send an invoice. So we really try to eliminate all the pain points for the travelers.
So this is the travel booking module. And then we've got an expense management module. And this is the same philosophy trying to reduce the pain points.
So typically for the expense, you just have to take a picture of your receipts when you leave a restaurant, for example, and then there will be an optical character recognition module that will pull all the information which is necessary for you to be reimbursed. It's going to be sent automatically to your approver and that's it for the travelers.
And Sebastian, I mean, do you have a, talking about your revenue model, do you have a SaaS model here or is it paper transaction or what? So you pay for a subscription per active user per month. So a company will pay that, not the actual end user? Absolutely. The company will pay for it, yes. So give me a general sense.
On average, what's a company pay for this kind of software for a year or a month? So you pay for a month and you pay per active user. If the user does not use the service for a month, you don't pay for this month. It's a very, very flexible model, fully SaaS. That's great. Yeah. So the question is, I'm trying to get a sense.
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Chapter 2: What is Raidu and how does it simplify travel and expense management?
Totally, totally understand that. Yeah, I completely understand that. And because it's a short episode, we don't have time to go on every single customer cohort. So what I try and do is hone in on a sweet spot. So is a sweet spot for you a team of 10 or a team of 100 or 100,000? What's the sweet spot? Well, again, we serve any types of companies, small and medium enterprises, large companies.
Initially, we were targeting more companies between, let's say, 100 and 1,000 employees. But the more we move forward, the more big clients are looking out outdoor and are actually very interested by our service. Okay, let me ask this differently just so we can get to an answer so we can move on because I want to capture the rest of your story.
If you take the total logos that are paying you and the total team members on those logos and you divide, that gives you a number. Is it 100 seats typically per account or 1,000? What's the number? Let's say it's going to be around 50 kilos per year. Okay, sorry, you said 50 team members per year? They would pay $50,000 per year. Got it. And do you know how many team members that is?
It's about 1,000? Well, yes. I think it's going to be around 1,000 on average. Correct. Okay. So a 1,000-person team would pay about 50 grand per year or about $5 per year per user. No, it's going to be $50,000 divided by $1,000, so $50 per year per user. Got it. Okay, fair enough. That's really helpful. Thanks for that. Take me back to your backstory here.
So you launched the company, I think you said you launched in 2018. Where was your head at that point? Were you quitting a corporate job or why start the company? So I was actually hired by Sodexo in 2015 to create a new business because Sodexo was interested to expand into the mobility industry. And so we, you know, we...
The first year, we took some time in order to meet some potential clients to understand what were the market rationals, what were the end-user pain points. And after this year, we set our strategy, which consisted in creating an end-to-end solution in the travel and expense industry, covering the full value proposition before the trip. during the trip and after the trip.
And then we built this value proposition. And to do it, we actually acquired two companies. One was named Expenditure, specialized in expense management. And the other was ILBATFOS, specialized in travel booking. We merged these two companies. We integrated them into one single entity. And we launched in June this year a new entity, a new name, a new brand, which was Raidu. Okay.
Just to be, okay. Let me get something clear though. Are you a hired gun of Sodeco or are you an actual founder with your own idea, your own capital, the majority ownership stake in the company founding Raidu? Yeah, I'm an employee of Sodexo and I helped Sodexo initiate a new business in the travel and expense area.
Okay, so let me ask you, as an entrepreneur, there's always a decision when you have a big corporate partner like Sodexo, right? Because you're doing all the hard work, you're basically a founder, but you, it sounds like, don't have a ton of equity in the company. You have some maybe to keep you incentivized, but...
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Chapter 3: What is the business model of Raidu?
$50,000 a year is about $4,000 a month times 6,500 customers. That puts you at $27 million a month in revenue. We're good, sorry. Can you repeat that, please? Yeah, does the math check out? So $50,000 a year would be about $4,000 a month in revenue per customer times 6,500 customers. That puts you at $27 million a month in revenue. Something seems off to me. So, yeah, let me repeat.
A company will pay between $6 and $10 per active user per month. Yeah, I understand that. You shared that, but you said the average team has about $1,000 and the average price is about $50,000 per year. Yeah, $50,000 per year, yeah. Okay, but that math doesn't work out, right?
If I take 50 grand per year times 6,500 paying customers, which is what you just said you had, that puts you at a run rate of $325 million a year. Yeah, I need to make the math. Sorry for that. But yeah, I need to make the math out of that. Maybe I didn't catch correctly a question you had. You have 6,500 paying customers today, correct? We have 6,500 clients. That's correct. Okay.
Those are paying customers. Correct. And they pay on average $50,000 per year. Yeah. Is it lower? It's okay if it's lower and we got miscommunicated, but I want to get the numbers correct because right now they're not. Are they paying much less than $50,000 per year on average? I don't have the average with me.
So again, there is a client that would pay $5,000 in total per year, although we pay much, much, much higher. It really depends. It's hard for me to say what is the average today. Okay, let me ask a different question. Can you give me a general sense of scale you're at today in terms of ARR? And a range is fine. In terms of what, sorry? In terms of ARR, annual recurring revenue. Typically 50,000.
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Chapter 4: How does Raidu's pricing structure work for companies?
So 50,000, but you know, there is a different... No, Sebastian, not ACV, because we talked about it. What I was asking is, can you give me a general sense today of your total company's size in terms of annual revenue? No, I cannot. I cannot share such a, such number. Okay.
You understand that what you've already shared does not make any sense because you shared a $50,000 annual price point and 6,500 customers and you're not doing $325 million per year. It's simple multiplication. So something's wrong. Yeah. So what I suggest maybe is that I would, you know, precisely investigate for this number and maybe I will get back to you. Okay.
But these are like, these are not like, I'm not asking like net revenue expansion, some crazy number that requires, I mean, these are like very basic SaaS metrics. I understand, but I prefer to give you a, you know, accurate information. So I prefer to, to get back to you on that. Okay.
Yeah, I mean, where I'm getting stuck here is I'll base my questioning based off certain things, like if you're enterprise, SMB, or mid-market, right? You know, the price point you gave me is not SMB. I'd say it's upper-mid pushing enterprise. But I don't know if that $50,000 number is actually accurate or not, which changes my line of questioning, right?
Depending on kind of what sector you're playing in. So I really need your help. I mean, I find it hard to believe you don't know what the average customer pays you per year. Well, the thing is that it's hard to disclose such information with you. I don't want, you know, Sodexo is listed on the stock market. So, you know, it's... Well, what did they share publicly?
What have you guys already shared publicly? You must have shared some of this publicly. No, we don't share such information publicly. Well, you have, I mean, you have investor calls. I assume these questions, obvious revenue questions are pretty basic questions they get asked. Yes, but I know, but Sodexo owns 100% of the company today. And Sodexo is listed on the stock market.
So I cannot disclose such. I understand that. But Sebastian, if you're on the stock market, you have earnings calls and you have to report revenue. So can I, I mean, do you want me to do the work right now and go look up the last earnings report and pull it out? Or can you share that with me if it's already public? I cannot share such information with you today, Nathan. I'm sorry.
Sebastian, I'm asking you to repeat something that has already been shared. Do they share anything publicly? They have to share something publicly. Not regarding my activity, not regarding the mobility business within Sodexo. Sodexo has 20 billion... Okay, so that's what I was asking, right? That's what they have publicly disclosed. So there's 20 billion per year.
So question back to you just said that they own 100% of the company. I'm so confused. You have such a background in this space. Why do this under the company? I mean, if you own no equity, you're basically coasting on a safe salary and maybe some benefits. Why would you not go out, take a risk and start this yourself? You know so much about the space.
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Chapter 5: What challenges did Sebastian face when launching Raidu?
Sure. Vincent Le Bunutel that founded Boosters. Spell it, Boosters. B-O-O-S-T dot R-S. It's a current development application. Number three, what billing tool do you guys use? What, sorry? What billing tool do you use? We actually have our own invoicing tool. It's not built on top of any underlying infrastructure? No. Number four, how many hours of sleep do you get every night? From four to ten.
That's an average of seven. And what's your situation? Married, single kids? Married, two kids. Oh, great. And how old are you? 43. 43. Last question. What do you wish your 20-year-old self knew? That you should sometimes just start doing things without overthinking. Guys, start without overthinking. In 2015, he got involved with Sodeco.
And then in 2018, spun out Raidu, a company, again, focused on a very specific vertical that the overall company was focused on. Obviously, the overall company is a publicly traded company. Raidu is focused on travel and expense management. Now serving out 6,500 customers, less than 3% annual revenue turn as they look to scale with their team of 300. Sebastian, thanks for taking us to the top.
Thank you, Nitin. Thank you. Bye-bye.