2025 Startup Equity & Workforce Report: APAC & ME

Introduction

New patterns are emerging in how startups across the Asia-Pacific and Middle East region (APAC and ME) are managing their equity and structuring their teams. The market has moved past the expansion-focused mindset of 2022. As of Q1 2025, many companies are taking more conservative approaches to both hiring and equity distribution.

This report analyzes data from private companies that use Carta and are headquartered in APAC and ME. For some data points, this larger region is broken down into three subregions: Australia and New Zealand (ANZ), East and Southeast Asia (ESEA), and Middle East and South Asia (MESA).

Carta’s data shows a stark reversal in workforce movement across APAC and ME. Between 2019 and 2022, the rate of hiring in the region far outpaced the rate of job departures. The annual count of new hires increased by 423% over that span, while departures were up 115%.

Since then, hiring has slowed, while departures—including both voluntary exits and layoffs—have continued to become more common. In 2024, annual hiring activity was up 131% compared to 2019, while the frequency of departures is up more than 400%. 

In some ways, startups in APAC and ME and those in the United States approach employee equity similarly. The median initial grant size given to employees in APAC and ME has declined more than  30% since 2021, mirroring trends in the U.S., where grants have also shrunk substantially in recent years. 

In other ways, startups in APAC and ME have distinct patterns. While the median employee stock option pool (ESOP) size in the U.S. is around 18% for startups at Series C and beyond, the corresponding figure for APAC and ME is 12%.

Key takeaways

• Hiring contraction continues: The era of aggressive hiring has ended across APAC and ME, with the hire-to-departure ratio falling below 2020 levels. This reflects a fundamental shift in how companies approach talent management.

• ESOPs level off as companies grow: ESOPs in APAC and ME expand from 7% of fully diluted equity at the pre-seed stage to 11% at seed, but remain in the 11-13% range at later fundraising stages. ANZ startups have larger ESOPs than those in ESEA or MESA.

• Option exercise rates are low: Only 28% of options whose strike price was lower than the fair market value (FMV) at time of exercise were exercised by employees in 2024. The exercise rate has fallen tremendously from a recent high of 60% in 2021.

• Vesting schedules are standardized: Like in the U.S., the vast majority of employee equity awards take the form of a four-year grant with a one-year cliff followed by monthly vesting.

• Some advisors and employees receive larger grants: Board members and pre-seed advisors in APAC and ME tend to receive even more equity than early employees. Companies offer the largest awards to employees in engineering, marketing, and customer success.

Employee headcount

The median pre-seed company in APAC and ME has four employees, while the median seed company has eight. This relatively compact team size reflects the focused product development and initial market validation efforts characteristic of emerging startups.

From Series A and up, companies start to expand rapidly, with median headcount more than doubling in size from the seed stage. Companies at Series C and beyond, which have typically validated their market fit, have a median of 81 employees and average of over 200. The high average value reflects a small number of very large companies, some of which are at much later stages than Series C.

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Our complete APAC & ME Insights report includes data on headcount and equity trends from nearly 700 companies.