As a Tunisian human rights activist within the 2000s, Amira Yahyaoui organized protests and blogged about authorities corruption. Within the interview, he described being crushed by the police. When she was 18, she mentioned, she was kidnapped from the road, deserted on the Algerian border and exiled for a number of years.
Ms. Yahyaoui's compelling background helped her stand out amongst entrepreneurs when she moved to San Francisco in 2018, the place she based a pupil support start-up known as Mos. The app climbed to the highest of Apple's App Retailer and Ms. Yahyaoui raised $56 million from high-profile traders, together with Sequoia Capital, John Doerr and Steph Curry, in line with PitchBook, which tracks start- oops. Mos was valued at $400 million.
In podcasts, TV interviews and different media, Ms. Yahyaoui, 39, typically discusses Mos's success.
Amongst different issues, he mentioned the initiative had helped 400,000 college students get monetary support. However inside firm information seen by The New York Instances confirmed that, firstly of final 12 months, solely about 30,000 clients had paid for Mos's pupil assist companies. The remainder of the 400,000 customers embody somebody who had signed up for a free account and should have obtained an e mail asking for pupil assist, two folks acquainted with the scenario mentioned.
After Mos expanded into on-line banking in September 2021, Ms. Yahyaoui advised publications like TechCrunch that the corporate had greater than 100,000 financial institution accounts. However these accounts had very small quantities of cash in them, in line with inside information. Lower than 10 p.c of the roughly 153,000 Mos financial institution customers had put their very own cash into their accounts, the information confirmed.
Some staff have tried to speak about Ms Yahyaoui's claims, mentioned Emi Tabb, who labored at Mos in operations and had roles as head of monetary support earlier than resigning on the finish of 2022. However Ms. Yahyaoui fired and generally belittled staff who tried to convey her again. towards his public feedback, 5 individuals who noticed the incidents mentioned.
“It has created a tradition of concern,” Mx. Tabb mentioned.
Mos is amongst a category of tech start-ups that grew in the course of the fast-money period of the late 2010s and the beginning of the pandemic, when younger corporations landed thousands and thousands of {dollars} in funding with little else. of guarantees. Now that cash has dried up and plenty of tech start-ups are going through a downturn, traders are extra demanding, clients are extra cautious of daring claims and staff are extra suspicious of founders' statements.
Final 12 months, Mos laid off about half of its employees of about 50 and closed its banking service. The corporate returned to its authentic enterprise of serving to college students discover monetary support and started to emphasise its use of synthetic intelligence.
Ms. Yahyaoui referred inquiries to a spokeswoman for Mos, who declined to remark. When Ms. Yahyaoui was requested final 12 months in regards to the variety of Mos customers, she published on social media that feminine founders are sometimes presumed responsible whereas male founders are presumed harmless.
“Perhaps in the present day we should always begin making use of the presumption of innocence to feminine founders as properly,” she wrote.
This account of Mos is predicated on interviews with eight present and former staff, in addition to inside communications, displays and analytics. The interior paperwork will proceed till 2023.
Ms Yahyaoui grew up in Tunisia and later lived in exile in France. After shifting to San Francisco, he raised cash for Mos from traders together with Expa, the funding agency began by Garrett Camp, an Uber founder. Mos offered a service to assist college students discover sources of monetary support, charging $149 for every faculty 12 months.
Deena Shakir, an investor at Lux Capital, which backed Mos in 2020, mentioned she and the agency's companions “actually respect” Ms Yahyaoui.
“We’re proud to assist corporations and founders like Amira whose dedication to enabling entry for college kids offers us hope for the way forward for larger training,” mentioned Ms. Shakir.
Mos had a sluggish begin, three folks with data of the corporate mentioned. Some college students who signed up realized about support they already knew about, corresponding to a Cal Grant for California residents, they mentioned.
An investor presentation seen by the Instances confirmed that Mos had a month-to-month revenue of $340,000 in December 2019. The beginning-up allowed customers to pay $1 upfront and the remaining $148 after they have the their monetary support.
Mos in the end didn’t gather most of that cash. Seventy p.c of customers didn’t pay their funds after the pandemic in 2020, Jess Lee, an investor in Sequoia who’s on the board of Mos, mentioned later in an article in regards to the firm revealed within the Sequoia web site.
By the top of 2022, about 6,500 of Mos' paying clients, or 22 p.c, had obtained refunds for his or her monetary support service, in line with inside information. The corporate had advised clients that in the event that they didn't get 5 occasions the price of Mos' companies in monetary support, they might get a refund.
Mr he said may assist college students entry $160 billion in scholarships, however that quantity included loans, three folks acquainted with the scenario mentioned. The corporate's pitch was to assist college students keep away from debt.
Ms. Yahyaoui additionally mentioned that college students who used Mos “saved” a median of $16,000. It was the quantity that the startup decided they certified and never what college students obtained in support, mentioned three folks with data of the corporate.
Mos's web site features a shifting ticker of glad clients (“Jasmine obtained $12,237 for Cal Poly,” for instance). Ms. Yahyaoui requested staff to make use of inventory pictures and make up names, three folks with data of the corporate mentioned.
In 2021, monetary expertise was scorching with traders. Ms Yahyaoui pushed Mos to develop into a financial institution, making its monetary support product free. That September, the start-up introduced its transfer into banking with a promotion that gave folks $5 to enroll and one other $5 for every referral.
Entries paid in. Mos disabled the $5 promotion on its first day. Two months later, he reactivated it for 3 days and signed up greater than 100,000 accounts, spending about $1 million on promotion and sending Mos to the highest of the App Retailer.
The sign-ups piqued the curiosity of traders, together with funding agency Tiger International. Sequoia's Ms. Lee needed to see how most of the accounts that signed up in the course of the promotion remained energetic earlier than investing extra, two folks acquainted with the scenario mentioned. Sequoia inspired Ms. Yahyaoui to rent an out of doors agency to evaluate whether or not the accounts belonged to actual folks, the folks mentioned.
Some staff are additionally involved that most of the accounts don’t belong to actual folks, mentioned three folks acquainted with the scenario. As enrollment continued, Mos analyzed the accounts for probably fraudulent conduct in an inside working paper. In November, Ms. Yahyaoui restricted Ms. Lee's entry to that doc, two of the folks mentioned.
Shortly after, in February 2022, Tiger International introduced that it led a $40 million financing for Mos. Sequoia joined the deal. It isn’t clear what impression entry to the doc would have had on Sequoia's determination to take a position extra in Mos. Two folks acquainted with the scenario mentioned Ms. Lee retained entry to a broader information supply relating to the accounts.
In an announcement, Ms Lee mentioned: “Essentially the most profitable founders are those that have grit and are prepared to check new hypotheses and adapt. Amira is the embodiment of those qualities.”
Tiger International declined to remark.
Alongside the funding announcement, Sequoia revealed an article on its web site detailing Ms Yahyaoui's dramatic previous and entrepreneurial imaginative and prescient. It mentioned lower than 1 p.c of Mos's financial institution accounts have been closed, “an unheard-of statistic for a cash-based registration promotion.”
Few folks used the financial institution accounts, in line with inside information seen by The Instances. Of about 153,000 open accounts, 95 p.c had lower than $5 in them and a 3rd had a steadiness of zero by 2022, the information confirmed. Solely 9.5 p.c of account holders deposited cash into their accounts throughout that point.
Mos advised his board that 74 p.c of checking account holders have been college students, in line with a presentation seen by The Instances. However solely about 20 p.c have been 22 or youthful, in line with inside information, with about 45 p.c over the age of 30. Mos's revenue comes from transaction charges, which make up a lot of the income. complete of the corporate after changing into a financial institution, was much less. greater than $70,000 for the primary 9 months of 2022, two folks acquainted with the funds mentioned.
Ms. Yahyaoui generally scolded her superiors and threatened to fireside them if their efficiency didn’t enhance, in line with 5 individuals who witnessed such occasions.
Utilizing corporations, he wrote in a January 2022 message to staff that the corporate's mission was meaningless “due to how unhealthy we’re at doing” issues.
“I want folks I can depend on to beat my desires so I don't fall,” he wrote.
Ms Yahyaoui's remedy of staff – together with employed staff in Tunisia and Algeria – is opposite to her picture as an activist, Mx. Tabb mentioned.
At an worker assembly in September 2022, a Mos worker requested Sequoia's Ms. Lee about her largest concern in regards to the startup, three individuals who attended mentioned. Ms. Lee initially mentioned she was stunned by how good morale was given the circumstances, then added that it was unclear what Mos's product can be.
The startup was in additional of a “seed stage,” or very early in its improvement, Ms. Lee mentioned.
