India’s gig economy has taken off in recent years, in line with the rise of the startup ecosystem. About 7.7 million workers were engaged in the gig economy in 2021, according to a Niti Aayog report, which further estimates it to expand to 23.5 million by 2030.
As the demand is growing, quite a few startups, including Apna and Vahan have emerged, which are looking to tap into the vast pool of blue-collar workforce. For white-collar gig workers, however, there are not many options like Apna or Vahan. Such workers are mostly reliant on traditional job portals or social networking platforms like Facebook or LinkedIn.
Delhi-based bootstrapped startup Picxele is looking to bridge this gap in the gig industry through an on-demand task-based platform.
Picxele founder Rishav Agarwal explained that his startup does not place itself as a conventional ‘job’ providing platform, which involves fixed salaries or income. Instead, it is a task-based platform where gig workers can make money as they complete a task, such as online surveys, transcription, and more.
“We’re specialized in tasks that can be done remotely and require fewer efforts and time,” he said.
For brands, the platform helps simplify the process of getting a particular task done in a set time frame and without worrying about hiring freelancers and managing them.
Picxele essentially aims at students and young professionals looking for task-based or part-time gigs during their free time. The startup caters to a wide range of sectors such as edtech, healthcare, mobile gaming, hyperlocal, fintech, and personal care, among others. Some of the gig opportunities available on the platform are marketing, which includes influencer marketing, content creation, and WhatsApp marketing, and operations, which include data entry, transcription, and merchant onboarding.
Agarwal added that the company charges on a task basis to companies and post keeping their margin and passes the rest onto the gig workers.
Picxele works with more than 300 companies, and to date, has facilitated more than 500,000 tasks through its platform. Agarwal disclosed that the company has 20,000 to 30,000 monthly active users. He added that most users are between the ages of 18 to 24. Around 50% to 60% of users are from tier 2 cities, whereas 20% to 25% are from tier 3 cities, Agarwal further said.
In the near future, Picxele will add more features, which include a mechanism to reward gig users on the number of tasks completed. The objective of gamification is to retain gig workers on a longer-term basis.
“We aim to hit around $1 million (Rs 8 crore approximately) in revenue in financial 2023-24. We aim to cross 1.5 million users, up from the current base of over 720,000, in the same period,” the founder added.
Agarwal wants to continue building the company without seeking external funding any time in the near future. But they might consider acqui-hire, merger, or similar opportunities with other companies, which could be looking to enter white or grey collar gig space.
