Ignacio Nieto Carvajal is CEO of Companio. On 1 December 2025 he wrote that the company had left Google Workspace for Zoho Workplace. This is his own post.
He is blunt about the product. Zoho is not better. He calls it far inferior on UX, integrations, and polish. They moved because it was five times cheaper.
If you are looking at the same route, start with the Google Workspace → Zoho Workplace playbook. Mo Alhabal’s eight-user write-up is the cutover diary. Ignacio’s post is the cost argument. He barely describes the import.
Why the bill mattered
Google Workspace was about €1,000 a month for 56 users. He puts that at 1% of monthly revenue, for email, calendar, and meetings. Companio is bootstrapped. That line grows with every hire.
A CTO had moved them off an internal Linux mail and calendar stack onto Google to “professionalize” the setup. When that CTO left, the €1,000 bill stayed.
Google offered a 20% discount to keep them. Ignacio’s reply, as he tells it, was that 20% does not fix a five-times gap, and that the product was a necessary evil, not a critical advantage.
He says Zoho gives them email, calendar, and meetings for 80% less. He can live with the UX quirks.
Those percents are his. I have not seen the Zoho invoice.
What he does not tell you
There is no export, no MX plan, no Shared Drive note, and no dual-run. He says migration is a hassle, and that one month of savings could pay a freelancer to do the whole job. After that, the difference is money for engineers.
Compare that with Mo’s ten-day diary on the same playbook. Shared Drive permissions drop. Calendar free/busy does not block by default. YouTube and Business Profile need a week-long ownership wait. Sign in with Google on third-party apps has to be replaced user by user. Zoho’s spam filter is weaker. Gmail labels can duplicate messages into folders.
Ignacio does not say they hit those, or that they skipped them. So they stay out of this write-up as facts about Companio.
Zoho’s official Google Workspace mail migrator still wants users created first, plus a service account and a JSON or P12 key. WorkDrive has its own migration path. Use those if you take his cost trade and still have to move 56 mailboxes.
What they gained
A smaller, flatter bill. He wants tools that scale with value, not with headcount, and he now audits pay-per-user services every month.
He does not publish open rates, meeting quality, or a support ticket about lost mail. The gain he is willing to stand behind is the 80% cut and the decision to accept a worse daily tool.
What I would copy
Write the monthly Google line as users times price, then again as a percent of revenue. Fifty-six people at €1,000 is the kind of number a founder can act on. A seat price alone is easier to ignore.
Do not let a departed CTO’s “professionalize” choice sit unreviewed. Ignacio’s Linux-to-Google step is how the bill arrived.
If you take the Zoho trade, budget a freelancer against one month of savings, and still run the playbook. Cost is not a cutover plan.
Expect the UX to feel worse if your team lives in Gmail. He already told you that. Tell people before you flip MX, not after.
The Google Workspace → Zoho Workplace playbook is the checklist I would run. Use Ignacio’s post for the 56-user, €1,000, “worse and cheaper” call. Use Mo’s post for the actual steps.