How Zoko runs compliance across two countries without its founders ever needing to sync up

Arjun Paul is a co-founder of Zoko, a Y Combinator-backed WhatsApp commerce platform. Like many Indian YC founders, Zoko runs a dual entity structure: a US company and an India entity, built to raise US capital while operating from India. It is a common setup, but in practice, it is one of the hardest things a founder can manage well.

The challenge

A dual entity structure means two tax systems, two filing calendars, and two sets of rules that rarely reference each other. Arjun's first problem wasn't compliance itself, it was finding anyone who understood both sides of it.

"It's kind of very complicated for founders to handle US and India because we are this Indian company in YC, we have to have these two entities,” Arjun says. And it's almost impossible to find accountants or lawyers who are familiar with both countries' laws, because there's no reason for them to learn it.

The professionals who could help had no incentive to specialize across borders. And the filings that fell through the cracks, the ones that add no visible value on a good day, were exactly the ones capable of creating serious risk on a bad one.

How Inkle helped

Inkle took over filings, registrations, and bookkeeping for the US entity, coordinating with their Indian accountants so Zoko didn't have to. Day to day, the relationship runs on Inkle's chat support; Arjun asks his account manager for what he needs and it comes back within 24 hours.

That speed proved critical when an enterprise customer requested a full vendor list for GDPR due diligence. Inkle pulled the list fast enough that it stopped being a deal blocker and the customer closed on schedule.

"The most complicated thing I asked for once was a list of every vendor we're paying, because I wanted to know where our data was going for a GDPR request. I quickly got that list, was able to finish it fast, and land that enterprise customer. It came from this organized system."

Arjun Paul, Co-Founder, Zoko.

The same organized system benefits Zoko when investors ask for documents. Every yearly financial record lives in one place, ready instantly. For Arjun, that readiness signals more than speed, it signals discipline. Investors read an organized financial record as a reflection of how a founder runs their company.

The impact

Two years into working with Inkle, Arjun and his counterpart on the India side have never needed to get on a call together. Inkle handles the coordination across both sides of the entity structure, the thing founders in this position usually end up doing themselves, badly, in the margins of their actual jobs. 

"We have never spoken in a meeting in two years," Arjun says. That's the real testament to Inkle working. It removes a huge headache that founders typically deal with. 

The clearest proof that this system actually works came from something Zoko didn't even know to ask about. While preparing a certificate of good standing for a UK enterprise customer, Inkle discovered that the registered agent address on file was wrong. It had been someone's home address for years, not Zoko's company address. Inkle caught this during routine preparation and corrected it before the UK customer's due diligence process could flag it as an issue.

Arjun did not have to ask for this check. Inkle found it because finding these details is how they operate across two countries. They run continuous scans for exactly the kind of compliance risks that are invisible until someone goes looking.

"Franchise tax, foreign qualification, all of this comes as a surprise to me every time. But Inkle is always looking for these things. Without them continuously scanning across both countries, I'd be the one catching these issues by accident during deals." 

Arjun Paul, Co-Founder, Zoko

It's a small detail with a large implication, the compliance risks that matter most are usually invisible until someone goes looking. With Inkle running that search continuously across two countries, Zoko's founders stay focused on the product, not the paperwork.