Gusto

Gusto is a people platform for small businesses, combining payroll, benefits and HR tools in a single system. Founded in 2011 and launched as ZenPayroll in 2012 before taking its current name, the company began with payroll and has since added health insurance, 401(k) administration, workers' compensation and HR and compliance tools. It reports serving over 400,000 businesses nationwide.

For engineers, the appeal of the domain is its density: payroll calculation, benefits enrolment, retirement plan administration and insurance are each regulated, data-heavy problems, and the platform integrates them rather than handling them separately. The stated design philosophy is to make such complex tasks simple and, in the company's words, "delightful, and even human".

Gusto employs more than 2,700 people across offices in San Francisco (its headquarters), Denver and New York, serving customers throughout the United States. The company describes its mission as growing the small business economy and creating a world where work empowers a better life, on the premise that taking care of the people who power small businesses helps those businesses thrive.