“Your post should feel like a thoughtful takeaway on leadership, not an ad,” the post said.
An Airwallex spokesperson declined to comment.
Airwallex chief executive Jack Zhang.Credit: Bloomberg
Airwallex, which was founded by Zhang and four university friends in a Melbourne coffee shop 10 years ago, but is now based overseas, provides a simplified platform for businesses to send money abroad. It has since evolved into one of Australia’s most valuable start-ups, backed by major venture capital firms including Airtree Ventures and Square Peg Capital, as well as prominent Chinese conglomerate Tencent.
But Airwallex has also faced significant media scrutiny of its internal workplace culture. In 2021, this masthead revealed that most of Airwallex’s compliance and legal employees told a staff survey that they would not recommend the company to others. It has faced negative reviews on workplace ratings forums.
Zhang later told this masthead that issues around staff satisfaction and internal culture were teething problems that stemmed from the company’s fast growth. In a separate interview with US broadcaster CNBC this week, Zhang said that the term “burnout” was not in his dictionary.
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“I never understand that terminology, to be honest. I’ve worked 100 hours a week from [the] age of 16 for 20-plus years,” Zhang said.
He said working long hours had been necessary to make ends meet while he was studying in Australia after he moved from China as a teenager.
Airwallex is reportedly eyeing up an initial public offering in the latter half of this year, with the company likely to be listed on the New York Stock Exchange rather than in Australia. Recently, Zhang has been increasing his media appearances and posting frequently on LinkedIn.
But he has also come under fire online. In a series of X posts last month, leading Silicon Valley venture capitalist Keith Rabois accused Airwallex of exposing sensitive American data to the Chinese government, alleging that Airwallex’s operations in the US would “create legal obligations to assist with CCP [Chinese Communist Party] espionage upon request”.
In response, Zhang accused Rabois of “circulating inaccurate claims” to benefit one of his firm’s portfolio companies, and maintained that no US data was sent to China. Within days of the pair’s spat, Airwallex announced that it had raised $330 million in a Series G funding round, which took its valuation to $US8 billion.
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