Flatpay is the fastest-growing company in Northern Europe — and will pass 1,000 employees in 2025

Two years ago, Flatpay was founded with an ambition to take on the monopolised payments industry. Today it has 400 employees, and over the course of 2025 it expects to reach 1,000.

With its entry into the payments market, Flatpay has made life easier for small and medium-sized businesses that have often been locked into standard products and a lack of customer service that takes them seriously.

Today Flatpay is present in four countries with 400 employees, and expects to reach 1,000 employees in 2025. Beyond products that resonate with SMEs’ needs and a customer service that is personal and action-oriented, Flatpay credits its ‘no-asshole culture’ as a large part of its success.

“When some people get promoted, they sometimes forget to treat others with respect. A leader who does not treat employees properly can be enormously demotivating for an organisation. It is incredibly important to surround yourself with people who have positive energy. We have succeeded at that. The opposite can be poison for an organisation,” says Rasmus Carlsen, Co-founder and CMO at Flatpay.

Freedom with responsibility

The organisation takes a learning-by-doing approach, placing significant responsibility with its employees. The opportunities for development and responsibility are meant to ensure that Flatpay’s culture is preserved as the company grows larger. When Flatpay recruits new employees, it looks for dedicated, talented people who want to develop. Potential and skills count for more than age and experience. With the right skills and motivation, a young, inexperienced candidate can be chosen over an experienced one with a gold-plated CV.

“We hire a great many people, and that requires a strong internal culture where everyone thrives on freedom with responsibility and dares to ask about the things they do not understand. As a company we challenge the status quo in the market, and that requires us to foster a culture where our employees dare to do the same internally. That is healthy for the company, because it gives us enormously ambitious employees,” says Camilla Wested, HR Partner at Flatpay.

Culture-carriers as the recipe for success

Flatpay’s foundation and culture were forged in Denmark. They are to be carried forward as the company opens in new countries and more than doubles its headcount in 2025. Flatpay does this by giving Danish employees responsibility and the opportunity to develop abroad, rather than recruiting externally. It should be possible to rise through the ranks, and that is highly valued when new markets open.

“There are good development opportunities because we are growing so fast as a company. It is a big priority for us to post existing employees abroad to take part in opening new markets. That way we believe we can spread our culture and DNA across Flatpay. Because we grow quickly, new opportunities are constantly arising for our employees. If we have people internally who can take on the role, we look there before searching externally,” says Camilla Wested, HR Partner at Flatpay.

Talent development and culture-carriers are inextricably linked and deeply rooted in Flatpay’s DNA. The company stands on the threshold of a new market in 2025, and when recruiting for top positions it prioritises culture-carriers. Culture-carriers are the recipe for success — knowledge of new markets can be learned.

“There is not a single country we are in where there is not a Danish director in the top job. Finland is the exception, but even there it was a Dane in the early years. Essentially, we pass the recipe for success on to the next country. The most important thing for us is that our leaders know Flatpay and the way we do things,” says Rasmus Carlsen, Co-founder and CMO at Flatpay.

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