Company overview
Storytel, founded in 2006 and headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, is a global leader in audiobook and e-book streaming services. With around 500 employees and operations in over 25 countries, the company offers a vast library of titles across multiple languages, including exclusive Storytel Originals. With a vision to inspire empathy and creativity through storytelling, Storytel aims to make great stories accessible anytime, anywhere.
The Challenge
Growing Pains: Excel-Based System Strains Under New Equity Program Complexity
In 2022, Storytel expanded its employee incentive program by launching restricted stock units (RSUs) to complement its existing stock options and Swedish warrants (teckningsoptioner). The addition of RSUs brought new challenges to their equity compensation strategy. While their spreadsheet-based system worked for earlier plans, it quickly proved inadequate as the program's complexity increased.
Tracking tax calculations, warrant expiration dates, and RSU vesting schedules through spreadsheets was not only time-consuming but also prone to errors. Meanwhile, employees faced cumbersome paper-based processes to exercise options or transfer shares. The challenge was compounded by regular changes in their internal consulting teams, creating a need for a solution that could be easily transferred between teams without disrupting operations.
In addition, manual processes created bottlenecks in financial reporting and compliance, particularly with IFRS 2 standards. As a result, this significantly strained the finance team during audits and reporting cycles.
"The challenge isn't just about replacing Excel, it is about having a trusted partner who could help facilitate exercise processes and manage every equity-related item in one place.”
The Solution
Centralized Solution Delivers Compliance, Efficiency, and Global Access
To address these challenges, Storytel partnered with Optio Incentives, which provides a comprehensive platform to manage employee incentive programs.
The administrator portal has become the centralized hub to manage all aspects of the program efficiently. It allows Storytel to track grants, automate processes like vesting schedules, and ensure compliance with accounting standards such as IFRS 2. By centralizing data, the system simplifies transitions between consultants or administrators. New team members now can quickly access all relevant data and historical records in one place, ensuring operational continuity and minimizing disruptions during handovers.
Employees can easily track their vesting schedules, exercise options, and access information about their benefits through their participant portal. In addition, the platform simplifies share transactions with its "sell to cover" feature, which helps employees handle tax withholding automatically. Direct share transfers are supported to personal accounts in Sweden, Denmark, Spain, Finland, and Italy, making it easy for employees to receive and manage their shares.
Advanced financial reporting tools, like IFRS 2 reporting and Monte Carlo simulations for valuation, help simplify compliance and financial reporting, ensuring accuracy while reducing the workload for Storytel’s finance team. This has been especially important as the company moved away from manual processes like Excel-based calculations.
The Result
Results That Matter: From Manual Processes to Seamless Operations
By implementing Optio’s all-in-one platform, Storytel significantly improved efficiency, accuracy, and flexibility while enhancing the experience for both administrators and participants.
• All-in-One Solution: With everything managed in one place, the platform has simplified operations and made transitions between teams much smoother.
• Improved Reporting Accuracy: Monte Carlo valuation ensures audit-ready financial reporting, helping Storytel comply with accounting standards like IFRS 2.
• Flexible Reporting: Optio’s platform allows Storytel to group employees by cost centers or other categories, providing better insights into program costs and performance.
• Simplified Share Transactions: The "sell-to-cover" feature helps employees avoid the hassle of out-of-pocket expenses and ensure compliance with tax regulations.
"Optio has been a great partner throughout this process. The platform has reduced administrative burden and made it much for our employees to benefit from the program. The team has been very helpful and quick to respond whenever we’ve needed support.”
