MatX
MatX and Plane: One trusted platform that scales and responsive support from real humans
Location
Fully remote
Team size
90
Industry
Startup
Founded
2024
MatX is a fast-growing company based in Silicon Valley that designs hardware for AI models. With a team of 90 employees, MatX plans to expand by another 50 percent in 2026. As the People Team Lead, Aly Patnode oversees the entire payroll operation for the company, covering U.S. employees, international EOR employees, and a global network of contractors.
Having guided ten different companies away from platforms like Gusto and Rippling, Aly knew from experience that MatX had outgrown those systems.
“Do-it-all systems often don’t do anything particularly well,” Aly explains. “HR is full of edge cases, and when a system forces you into binary decisions, things break fast.”
She had seen tax errors go unnoticed for months, reports misaligned or incorrect, slow or AI-based support, and weeks of work lost to manual audits. As MatX scaled, she needed a platform built for real-world HR workflows, not rigid templates.
MatX
💜 Plane
Unified payroll for U.S. employees, global contractors, and international employees
Direct access to real humans for urgent payroll questions
Simple, efficient payroll processing with minimal clicks
Transparent pricing and strong partnership with the product team
Why MatX moved away from Gusto
When Aly joined MatX, payroll was running through Gusto, but the platform couldn’t keep up with the company’s needs.
“You can’t trust the data. Reports glitch, cells misalign, numbers shift — and you end up auditing everything manually,” Aly says. “That completely defeats the purpose of an automated payroll system.”
Support was another pain point: “When something breaks, you get AI-scripted responses. Nothing gets truly resolved. You can’t wait a month for help when payroll is wrong.”
MatX needed a platform with accuracy, flexibility, and fast human support.
Choosing Plane
When evaluating alternatives, Aly focused on five core criteria:
1. Transparent pricing
2. Direct, human customer support
3. Openness to product feedback
4. Flexible workflows that support real HR edge cases
5. Clean, intuitive UX that scales with headcount
Plane was the clear fit.
“I look for systems where I can directly give feedback to product managers and actually see improvements,” says Aly. “Plane has that. I can tag someone in Slack and get a real answer fast.”
Plane also allowed MatX to run all payroll — from U.S. employees to global contractors to their international employees — inside one unified, simple workflow.
A modern payroll experience for a modern team
Payroll at MatX now runs with what Aly calls the “three-click approach.”
“Review payroll, hit approve, done. It’s simple. It’s clean. It’s fast,” she says.
Onboarding is equally smooth. Employees and contractors have their own self-serve Plane accounts to handle banking, tax documents, and setup, dramatically reducing overhead on the People team.
Aly also highlighted Plane’s flexible bonus processing and user-friendly off-cycle payroll workflows: “I like that there are multiple ways to add bonuses. It’s intuitive and gives me flexibility depending on the situation.”
Support that actually shows up
The biggest differentiator? Direct access to real humans.
“I love that I can tag someone [on Slack] I know by name. Rob for product questions, Irene for payroll and tax, Joseph for general support. I get actual answers, not scripts,” says Aly.
This responsiveness drastically reduced the time spent diagnosing issues or resolving any urgent payroll questions across MatX’s nearly 100 team members.
A better experience for employees
MatX’s employees and contractors barely need to touch the payroll system, and that’s exactly what Aly wants.
“In Gusto, because there were so many errors, employees had to constantly monitor their payroll. With Plane, everything just runs smoothly. They log in only for onboarding or when they need tax documents.”
The simplicity brings trust and stability, crucial for a company scaling as quickly as MatX.
The bottom line
Plane gives MatX what fast-growing companies need most: A payroll platform that is simple, reliable, flexible, and backed by fast, human support: “I’ve helped a lot of companies move off Gusto and Rippling. Plane is different. It’s responsive, flexible, and built for real HR workflows. It’s been a great experience for us.”
