Fintech Startup Brex looks outside traditional tech hubs for new hires

• Brex will have engineers based in states such as Alaska, Georgia and Tennessee, according to job postings.
• The fintech startup follows companies like Oracle in hiring outside of traditional tech hubs.
• But despite openings, Brex laid off about 11% of employees in October.

Fintech darling Brex plans to hire more employees based outside traditional tech hubs like San Francisco and New York City, following other Silicon Valley companies looking to different geographies to build out their workforce.

For more engineering jobs at the start-up, Brex requires potential new hires to be located in multiple states, despite offices in Draper, Utah and San Francisco. Roles such as senior software engineer for product insights, intern software engineer, software engineer for the front-end comms platform and a position for graduates on the software engineering team all show the demand, according to Insider’s analysis of job postings on its website. .

Brex made the decision in 2020 to go completely external and hire talent across the country, the company said in an email to Insider.

“Although we have employees in major hubs, being able to unlock talent anywhere has been a major competitive advantage for us,” the company said. Instead of limiting its hiring pool to San Francisco, the startup can now draw on qualified candidates from anywhere, it said.

Candidates must be located in Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Louisiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Wisconsin or Wyoming. However, Brex said in the listing that applicants in Texas must be based in San Antonio and Houston, and candidates cannot be based in Miami, which has already become a tech hub in its own right.

Brex, valued at $12.3 billion, offers companies business credit cards, cash management and expense services. While it started with a focus on smaller startups and enterprises, Brex announced a pivot to more mid-market customers in June and focused on expanding its products. Aiming to be a one-stop shop for startups’ banking needs, it acquired accounting platform Pry Financials in April. But Brex sued Pry Financials CEO Andy Su for concealing an ongoing lawsuit. Su had brought an unfair dismissal case against Brex.

Then, in October, the fintech laid off 136 employees or roughly 11% of its workforce, according to TechCrunch. In a memo to employees, Brex CEO Pedro Franceschi said the current economic environment contributed to the decision to lay off workers.

But Brex is not the only company expanding its working horizons amid a market downturn. Tech workers were traditionally concentrated in certain hubs, but research showed that telecommuting helped expand tech talent to many other cities.

For example, database giant Oracle wants to consider candidates outside of New York, San Francisco and Seattle because it wants to avoid higher salaries in those areas, Insider reported last month. Oracle had been looking to cut $1 billion in costs and had recently been laid off.

But in addition to the cost-cutting benefits other companies are experiencing, hiring outside technology hubs escapes some traditional talent constraints, Brex said.

“Talent is spread all over the world and being remote gives us access to a wider talent pool,” Brex said in a statement.