8 hrs
to onboard 8 person team
83%
lower fee -Husys $99 vs $599/mo
~70%
lower fully loaded cost per character artist
$0
termination fees when the team scaled down
Client Details
Company
Confidential
Headquarters
Canada
2016
Manifest Global
Industry
Animation
Company Size
30 member team
Website
Employer of Record (EOR)
What Do They Do?
Our client is a Canadian animation studio producing character animation for episodic and streaming content, where headcount needs swing hard between pre-production, production peak, and delivery.
Domestic character-artist and animator salaries had climbed enough that scaling the team for each production cycle was getting harder to justify on a per-episode budget.
The Challenge
The studio needed a bench of character artists and animators it could scale up for production peaks and back down after delivery, without carrying full-time domestic headcount through every gap between seasons. It evaluated other EOR providers first and ran into the same wall repeatedly:
- One well-known global EOR platform quoted $599 per employee per month, before the underlying salary, making the flexible-team model expensive enough to offset much of the intended cost saving
- Domestic character-artist and senior-animator compensation had risen enough in recent years that in-house hiring alone no longer supported the studio’s per-episode budgets
- The studio needed genuine confidence in India compliance depth, PF, ESI, professional tax, gratuity, not just a vendor’s word that it was handled
- Ramping a team up for a production peak and back down after wrap needed to be possible without termination fees eating into the savings
How Husys Resolved The Challenge
The studio engaged Husys as EOR to build a character-art and animation bench in India that could flex with its production calendar.
- Character artists and animators were onboarded in India within 8 working hours of each contract signature, with IP assignment and NDA clauses standard in every contract, not sold as an add-on
- Payroll, PF, ESI, professional tax, TDS, and gratuity were handled end-to-end by Husys across the relevant Indian states, with the studio’s finance team seeing the true all-in cost of every hire upfront
- The team scaled up ahead of a production peak and back down after delivery, with no setup fees, no termination fees, and no long-term lock-in required at either end
- The studio kept full control of creative direction, task assignment, and review cycles, Husys handled only the legal employment layer
The Results
The studio now treats its India character-art bench as a standing part of its production model rather than a one-off cost-cutting exercise.
- Husys’ $99/employee/month EOR fee ran roughly 83% lower than the $599/month quoted by the alternative the studio had shortlisted
- Fully loaded cost per character artist landed roughly 65–70% below the equivalent Canadian hire, in line with current market rates for mid-level character artists in India
- Each new hire was onboarded within 8 working hours, letting the studio staff up for a production peak without a multi-week hiring lag
- The team scaled down after delivery with zero termination fees, preserving the savings the flexible model was built to capture
- Compliance, PF, ESI, PT, TDS, gratuity, has run without incident since the engagement began
“Husys' $99/month vs $599 with other service provide. The math was obvious. Husys's India depth gave us the compliance confidence we needed for our distributed animation team.”
How Husys Can Help Your SaaS Company
Production headcount doesn’t move in a straight line, and your EOR shouldn’t charge you as if it does.
Husys prices at $99/employee/month with no setup fees and no termination fees, so scaling a team up for a production peak and back down after delivery doesn’t cost you the savings you built the model to capture.
For more write to us at reach@husys.com
