Lano Overview & 2025 Industry Position
Lano is a leading global workforce platform empowering businesses to compliantly hire, manage, and pay talent across 150+ countries. As we step into 2025, Lano holds a significant position in cross-border payroll and contractor management, bridging the ERP-HCM-PEO gap with robust compliance tooling, automated payroll orchestration, and native integrations. With companies scaling globally faster than ever, Lano simplifies global hiring through a single platform—an essential trend for 2025’s remote-first and compliance-critical HR operations.
From Launch to 2025: Lano’s Journey
Lano was founded in 2018 with a clear mission: simplify global employment. The Berlin-based startup quickly gained momentum for offering an intelligent layer between employers and a vast network of PEOs, payroll vendors, and local entities. Key milestones include:
- 2018: Founded in Berlin; MVP launched for freelancer payments
- 2020: Expanded contractor management features; 40+ country support
- 2021: Series A funding ($20M); rolled out multi-country payroll automation
- 2022: Integrated compliance monitoring and document lifecycle tools
- 2023: Hit 300+ platform integrations, full EOR support in 100+ countries
- 2025: Launched AI-powered compliance intelligence and real-time tax localization modules
2025 Strategy Thesis: Become the connective compliance layer for global employment—integrating legal, financial, and HR data to enable real-time decision-making across borders.
Lano Key Features
Lano caters to global HR, finance, and operations leaders with a modular suite of features that combine breadth and speciality:
- Employer of Record (EOR): Hire full-time employees in 100+ countries compliantly via Lano partners.
- Contractor Management: Onboard and manage freelancers from anywhere with localized templates and audit trails.
- Multi-Country Payroll: Aggregate payroll from local vendors across countries into a unified dashboard with validation tools.
- Payments Engine: Pay global teams in 50+ currencies on-time with built-in FX management and bulk payments.
- Compliance & Documentation: Build workflows around contract approvals, local regulation tracking, and deadline alerts.
- AI Compliance Watcher: Launched in 2025 to flag documentation or entity risks based on local tax/employment laws.
Workflow & UX
Lano’s dashboard is structured into functional blocks (contracts, payments, compliance, payroll, integrations) accessible via a top menu. Each module launches a task-driven workflow that guides users through input steps, approvals, and documentation. The contract generation tool includes regional templates and auto-fill fields. The global calendar offers flags for local holidays and submission deadlines. Mobile responsiveness is excellent, though bulk actions are best managed on desktop.
Lano Pricing Analysis & Value Metrics
As of July 2025, Lano offers transparent, modular pricing based on company type and scale:
| Plan | Cost | Includes |
|---|---|---|
| Contractor Management | $29/user/mo | Onboarding, compliance, payment engine, contractor chat |
| Employer of Record | From $499/employee/mo | Local hiring, benefits, payroll, contracts |
| Global Payroll Automation | Custom Quote | Vendor integrations, payroll reporting, alerts |
| Enterprise Suite | Custom | BI access, API, full localization and user roles |
Lano is competitively priced vs equivalents like Oyster or Remote, particularly on contractor workflows and modular payroll add-ons.
Competitive Landscape
Lano competes with Remote, Oyster, Deel, and Papaya Global. Compared to these options:
- Remote: Broader benefits tools, but less modular for contractors
- Deel: Excellent UI but pricier and less customizable in payroll
- Oyster: Similar contractor tools; Lano wins on integrations
- Papaya: Enterprise-grade compliance but higher entry barrier
Lano Use Cases
Where Lano shines:
- Startups: Hire dev/marketing talent globally quickly within budget
- Agencies: Manage freelance teams through one control panel
- Enterprises: Centralize multi-country payroll reporting
- Compliance-Heavy Sectors: Legal, finance, and healthcare hiring in regulated markets
Pros & Cons
- Pros: Modular pricing; powerful compliance tools; intuitive UX; deep integrations
- Cons: EOR starts pricey; learning curve for admins; limited in-house payroll engine
Lano Integrations
Integration highlight:
- Accounting: NetSuite, QuickBooks, Xero
- Payroll & HR: Workday, BambooHR, Gusto, SAP SuccessFactors
- Payments: Wise, Payoneer, Stripe
- Communication: Slack, Microsoft Teams (for contract alerts)
With over 300 integrations, Lano blends into finance, HR, and legal systems effortlessly.
Pro Tip: Work with your finance or legal team to configure Lano’s document flows to auto-trigger audits and local form generation on contract change—this avoids delays during global expansion.
Final Thoughts
Lano is a well-rounded platform for businesses serious about global hiring without administrative chaos. Ideal for SMEs scaling cross-border teams, freelancers-heavy companies, and compliance-sensitive sectors. Its biggest edge in 2025 is bringing payroll, legal, and contract data into a single compliance view, enhanced with AI. If your stack lacks a unified global operations layer, Lano delivers both breadth and depth—especially in how it empowers operations teams to move fast and stay compliant.
Lano FAQ
Yes, Lano’s contractor module is standalone. You can onboard, manage, and pay freelancers without using Employer of Record services.
Lano uses AI-powered compliance engines and integrations with legal databases to track and flag country-specific tax requirements and documentation needs.
Wire transfers, SEPA, ACH, SWIFT, and partner integrations like Payoneer and Wise are supported based on region and payout format.
Yes, Lano offers RESTful APIs that allow developers to sync contracts, user data, payment logs and more with internal systems.
Lano provides Employer of Record capabilities in over 100 countries, including the EU, UK, US, Canada, LATAM, APAC, and Africa.
