BENGALURU: Sixteen founders of ten listed new-age companies earned a combined ₹43.4 crore in fixed remuneration in 2025-26, up 8.2 per cent from ₹40.2 crore a year earlier, according to Inc42's founder salaries tracker, published on October 6. Average fixed pay per founder rose to ₹2.7 crore from ₹2.5 crore.
Twelve of the 16 founders got a raise, three took a cut and one was paid the same. The ten companies tracked are Lenskart, Meesho, Delhivery, Paytm, Honasa Consumer, Ather Energy, FirstCry, Swiggy, Nykaa and Shadowfax, all of which are listed on the stock exchanges.
Who earned the most
Peyush Bansal of eyewear company Lenskart had the highest fixed pay, ₹5.7 crore, slightly down from ₹5.8 crore. Meesho's founders, Vidit Aatrey and Sanjeev Kumar, each earned ₹4.8 crore, up 6.7 per cent from ₹4.5 crore. Paytm's Vijay Shekhar Sharma was paid ₹4 crore, plus ₹33 lakh in perquisites; he was the only one of the 16 founders whose fixed pay did not change.
At logistics company Delhivery, Sahil Barua's fixed pay rose 21.4 per cent to ₹3.4 crore and Kapil Bharati's 17.9 per cent to ₹3.3 crore. Lenskart co-founder Neha Bansal's rose 17.4 per cent to ₹2.7 crore.
The largest percentage increase went to Ghazal Alagh of Honasa Consumer, the maker of Mamaearth, whose pay rose 60 per cent to ₹2.4 crore from ₹1.5 crore. Her co-founder Varun Alagh's rose 9.1 per cent to ₹2.4 crore. Ather Energy's Tarun Mehta and Swapnil Jain each earned ₹2.1 crore, up 5 per cent, and logistics firm Shadowfax's Abhishek Bansal and Vaibhav Khandelwal ₹1.1 crore each, up 10 per cent.
FirstCry's Supam Maheshwari's pay rose 7.7 per cent to ₹1.4 crore. Three founders took cuts: Nykaa's Falguni Nayar had the steepest, 14 per cent, to ₹74 lakh from ₹86 lakh; Swiggy's Sriharsha Majety's fixed pay fell 12.5 per cent to ₹1.4 crore from ₹1.6 crore; and Peyush Bansal's fell 1.7 per cent.
Where the real money is
Fixed salaries are only part of the picture. "Bonuses, performance incentives, and ESOP-related benefits substantially exceeded fixed salaries for some founders," Inc42 reported.
The largest by far was at Swiggy, where Majety realised ₹549.3 crore in gains from employee stock options, nearly 400 times his fixed pay. FirstCry's Maheshwari had stock options worth ₹31.7 crore. Lenskart's Peyush Bansal received ₹12 crore in bonuses and incentives, more than twice his fixed pay, and Neha Bansal ₹6 crore. Delhivery's Bharati had ₹6.9 crore in ESOP gains and Barua a ₹33.7 lakh incentive. Varun Alagh received ₹2.4 crore in incentives, Ather's founders ₹90 lakh each in variable pay, and Ghazal Alagh a ₹6 lakh incentive.
Pay and performance
At Lenskart, the two founders' bonuses and incentives together came to ₹18 crore, against combined fixed pay of ₹8.4 crore. At Delhivery, Bharati's ₹6.9 crore in option gains was more than twice his salary. Ather's founders each received ₹90 lakh in variable pay on top of ₹2.1 crore in fixed pay. Inc42 did not record any other compensation for Meesho's two founders, for Nykaa's Nayar or for Shadowfax's founders.
The tracker's figures show fixed pay rising modestly for most founders, while for several of them stock options and incentives were worth far more than their salaries.
Some of the companies have been doing well. Honasa, whose founders received among the larger increases, said on October 6 that it expects net sales to grow in the low thirties per cent in the September quarter, and its shares rose 8.2 per cent on the day, Inc42 reported.
The list may grow as more startups go public. PhonePe, Zepto, Razorpay, OYO and others have filed draft papers for listings, according to Inc42's IPO tracker.
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