Yahoo Finance E-Commerce Startup Bazaar Scores Pakistan’s Second-Biggest Funding Round
(Bloomberg) -- Pakistan’s e-commerce startup Bazaar Technologies Pvt. raised $70 million in funding led by Dragoneer Investment Group and Tiger Global Management, scoring the nation’s second-largest funding round.
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It marks the first investment by Dragoneer in the world’s fifth-largest nation, which had a breakout year for startups in 2021. Pakistan companies raised more than $350 million last year, greater than the amount over the previous six years combined. Among the venture capital firms making their first-time investments in the country recently are Kleiner Perkins, FJ Labs and RTP Global.
Bazaar targets the $170 billion domestic retail industry that operates mostly offline and sees small merchants purchasing inventory from multiple suppliers. The startup’s platform consolidates sourcing supplies for mom-and-pop stores and helps them digitize transactions and manage inventory.
The company was founded by two high-school friends less than two years ago and now operates in 21 cities across Pakistan, covering 30% of the population. Bazaar reaches over 500 towns, according to its website, and is on course to become the nation’s largest tech-backed last-mile delivery service by the end of the year.
Bazaar has more than 2.4 million businesses on its Easy Khata platform that helps businesses with customer engagement, inventory tracking, accounting and lending. It has recorded over $10 billion in transactions in annualized bookkeeping. It also provides staggered payment options to customers.
Existing investors, including Indus Valley Capital, Defy.vc, Acrew Capital, Wavemaker Partners, B&Y Venture Partners and Zayn Capital, also participated in the Series B round.
While neighboring India has long had a vibrant startup scene, foreign investors have viewed Pakistan as a riskier bet due to security concerns, power shortages and a lack of digital infrastructure. But the country’s potential for fintech and retail startups is huge: two-thirds of the population of more than 200 million is under 30, but most shopping is still done in cash and relatively few people have a bank account. Internet users have more than tripled in the past five years to about 110 million.
“Pakistan is at an inflection point in its tech ecosystem development,” said John Curtius, partner at Tiger Global.
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