South Asia Investor Review

Technology startups in Pakistan received record $249 million funding during January-June 2022, up a whopping 171% from the same period last year. A total of 35 deals closed, up 6% from the first half of 2021. July 2022 saw a maiden investment from Sequoia Capital which is considered among the top venture capital firms headquartered in Silicon Valley, California.  Last year was a banner year for Pakistani startups with $310 million venture capital investments.  Venture Capital Investments in MENAPT Region 1H/22. Source: Magnitt Sequoia Capital and Kleiner Perkins co-led $17.6 million seed round in Islamabad-based fintech startup DBank this month. DBank has been founded by Tania Aidrus and Khurram Jamali, both of whom have studied the challenges the unbanked population faces closely at their previous stint at Google, where they worked on payments rails for the company’s Next Billion Users initiative, according to Tech Crunch .  Soaring VC Investments in Pakistani Startups...

Global  e-commerce  giant Amazon has recently added several dozen Pakistani exporters to its approved list, according to Eric Broussard, vice president of Amazon International Seller Services. "We are excited to announce that as of today, Pakistani entrepreneurs are eligible to sell on Amazon. We are eager to work with Pakistan's dynamic business community, including small and medium-sized sellers and help connect them with customers around the globe," he said.    Amazon Global Marketplace. Source: Wikipedia Amazon e-commerce platform has global reach. As of March 2021, Amazon Marketplace operates and sells in 18 countries, mostly in advanced economies of Europe, Japan and North America as well as in emerging markets like Brazil, China, India, Arab Gulf states and Turkey. It boasts  200 million members  for its Amazon Prime program that offers fast free shipping and other benefits, including Prime Video streaming for a fixed annual fee. The company hosts mi...

Although the rate of growth has slowed since 2018, Pakistan's middle class consumer population still remains among the fastest growing in the world. In a report titled " Emerging Markets Transforming As Velocity Markets ", Ogilvy and Mather, a global market communications firm, has put Pakistan among what it calls "Velocity 12" group of economies that include Bangladesh, Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Myanmar, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines and Vietnam.  The term velocity describes both the rate of real change in the size of the middle class as well as a priority for companies as they consider business investment and marketing in V12 countries. These 12 countries will be the biggest contributors to the next billion middle class consumers, according to the report. The Velocity 12 report says that this next billion middle-class group will: 1. Be increasingly defined by women and youth as the change agents, with purchasing power crossing cultur...

Media  reports  suggest global e-commerce behemoth Amazon.com could purchase substantial stake in Pakistan's  e-commerce  site  Clicky.pk.  This comes on the heels of a Bloomberg story that quoted anonymous sources indicating Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba is in serious negotiations to acquire Daraz.pk.  Online sales in Pakistan's $152 billion retail market are doubling every year,  according to Adam Dawood of Yayvo online portal. He expects them to  pass $1 billion  in the current fiscal year (2017-18), two years earlier than the previous forecast. Amazon's Presence in Pakistan: Amazon already owns about 33% stake in Clicky.pk through its acquisition in 2017 of Dubai-based online retailer Souq.  Souq acquired this stake in the Pakistani company in late 2016. In March this year,  Bloomberg  cited sources saying that Alibaba and Daraz.pk are negotiating a a price for the acquisition. It said that the "deliberatio...

Pakistan saw its first Black Friday sales this year. These retail sales were on at both brick-and-mortar stores and e-tailers like Daraz.pk . There were also media reports indicating similar sales in the UK and other countries as well.  For those unfamiliar with Black Friday, let me explain what it is. Black Friday, a day of mega sales by retailers, follows Thanksgiving Day in America. Black Friday marks the start of the annual Christmas shopping season that accounts for about half the annual retail revenue and much of the profits earned by US retailers. Thanksgiving is a quintessential American holiday that commemorates the arrival of European "Pilgrims" fleeing religious persecution across the Atlantic. It is celebrated with a dinner of turkey, cranberries and corn that made up the feast offered by native Americans, also known as American Indians, to welcome the hungry and tired Europeans in this continent of North America. President Barack Obama used the occasion to ...

Guest Post by Monis Rahman Founder, Chairman and CEO of Rozee.pk Pakistan is late to the party. E-commerce is booming throughout our immediate region. India's leading e-commerce website, Flipkart, recently raised a record $1 Billion in new investment, handling 5 Million shipments each month. The website sees so much potential in mobile shopping that it has a stated goal of becoming "the mobile e-commerce company of the future". To our north, China's e-commerce leader, Alibaba, set a global record when it listed its shares on the New York Stock Exchange in September. Alibaba's Initial Public Offering raised a staggering $25 Billion, making its record-breaking IPO the biggest in the world. Today the Chinese e-commerce giant's market capitalization is over $250 Billion exceeding that of Wal-Mart, the world's largest old economy retailer. The market value of e-commerce companies in Pakistan's immediate vicinity including Turkey, the Middle East, Ind...