WhatsApp Pay India Head Resigns Four Months Into the Role

WhatsApp pay India head, Vinay Choletti has stepped down after just four months after taking up the leadership role. Choletti announced his exit via a LinkedIn post on Wednesday.

"Today was my last day at WhatsApp Pay and as I sign off, I can proudly say that watching the scale and the influence of WhatsApp in India has been a humbling experience. The last one year personally has been a great learning journey and the excitement of being in the frontline and launching some global first payments use cases such as "QR tickets for Bangalore Metro on WhatsApp" was unmatched. I am humbled to see the customer adoption of novel use cases using WhatsApp Pay and I will wear these badges proudly for the rest of my life," Choletti wrote in his LinkedIn post.

WhatsApp Pay Head Moves on

Choletti joined WhatsApp in October 2021 as head of merchant payments at WhatsApp Pay, and took charge as the firm's head in September 2022.

WhatsApp Pay launched in September 2021, a month before Choletti joined, after several rounds of delay after launching for select users in November 2020.

Choletti, in his resignation note on LinkedIn, wrote about the heights WhatsApp Pay scaled within a year of launch. Choletti spoke about world-first payment use cases like QR code metro tickets for Bengaluru metro.

"I am humbled to see the customer adoption of novel use cases using WhatsApp Pay and I will wear these badges proudly for the rest of my life," Choletti wrote

Several Rounds of Exit at WhatsApp India

Choletti's resignation comes after several other top executives stepped down, including WhatsApp India head Abhijit Bose and Meta India public policy director Rajiv Aggarwal. Meta India chief Ajit Mohan also quit the firm to join Snap India.

While it's not clear who will take up the role of WhatsApp Pay head, the company's head Will Cathcart thanked him for his "tremendous contribution."

"I want to thank Abhijit Bose for his tremendous contributions as our first Head of WhatsApp in India. His entrepreneurial drive helped our team deliver new services that have benefited millions of people and businesses. There is so much more WhatsApp can do for India and we're excited to continue helping advance India's digital transformation," Cathcard wrote in a statement.