Startup Bazaar raises $70m to digitise Pakistan’s retail

• Bazaar taps digital potential of Pakistan's retail sector.
• B2B e-commerce platform offers procurement solutions to small and medium-sized retailers.
• Targets around 5mn small and medium-sized retailers operating across Pakistan.

Karachi: A Pakistani business-to-business (B2B) e-commerce platform, Bazaar Technologies, has raised $70 million in its Series B funding round, The News reported, citing the company.

Bazaar, which was launched during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic in June 2019, has attracted $1.3 million in pre-seed funding, $6.5 million in seed funding and $30 million in Series A funding.

The startup said in a tweet that the Series B funding round was led by investors including Dragoneer Investment Group, Tiger Global, Indus Valley Capital, Defy., Acrew Capital, Wavemaker Partners, B&Y Venture Partners, and Zayn Capital.

The B2B e-commerce platform is tapping the digital potential of the Pakistan's retail sector and offers procurement solutions to small and medium-size retailers.

As per the details provided on the company's official website, the startup has already penetrated into 21 cities. It targets around 5 million small and medium-sized retailers operating across Pakistan and eyes to cover over 100 urban and rural centres across the country, and build the largest network to move any category of goods from point A to B wherever needed.

In a recent interview, one of its founders Hamza Jawaid said the fundraising sends a huge message.

"It proves that you can build large and scalable businesses in Pakistan, and that should be an inspiration to other founders and entrepreneurs”.

Technology startups in Pakistan have attracted interest from investors within the country. Last year, another e-commerce platform Airlift secured $85 million in the largest Series B financing in Pakistan, while overall startups attracted $350 million in funding last year.

“Startups like Bazaar Technologies will eventually benefit fintechs as they will get data of small and medium-size stores,” said Pakistan Software Houses Association for IT and ITES (P@SHA) Chairman Badar Khushnood.

“Moreover, these startups are poised to bring efficiency to the retail sector.”

He said the country’s total business-to-consumer (B2C) e-commerce market size was $4 billion, adding that platforms like Bazaar had digitised wholesale-to-retail commerce sector.

“The wholesale and retail trade sector is the largest sub-sector of services in the country, maintaining a growth of 7.5% in the FY 2017-18, and contributing around 18.2% to GDP in FY 2019-20,” he shared.

“Within retail trade, around 54%of the retail units are engaged in the sale of food, beverages, and tobacco, and 80%of these are located in urban areas, employing 33% of the informal labor force.”