The year 2016 has been a good year for the startup scene in Pakistan. There is definitely no doubt to the fact that there has been a significant rise in the trend of entrepreneurship where we saw many new faces, jumping on to the bandwagon. These included students who started their own micro-companies from scratch and the grown professionals too who, tempted to the huge growth potential in the said field, started their IT ventures. We also saw many supporters making up their place by starting different incubation centers, providing mentorships and and investors who decided to support the startups monetarily.
As we finally bid farewell to the year 2016, like as always we at TechJuice have come up with a comprehensive research which accounts for the startups that have raised investments from different investors in the year 2016. We have tried our bit to gather information, but we do understand that the list is not complete, and is open to additions. So, without any further ado, get started with the study, we have researched for you.
1. Zameen.com
Founded in 2006 by an entrepreneur brother duo, Zameen.com today forms one of the largest property listing online portal in Pakistan. In 2012, it received its angel investment from a French property portal authority, Gilles Blanchard, and followed with a successful Series A round in 2014. In September last year, Zameen raised USD 9 Million as funds from three renowned international funds.
Zameen.com closed its Series C funding round with a USD 20 Million investment from one of its previous investors, this year. The founders had said that the investment was to be spent on EMPG’s existing ventures in Pakistan and UAE, as well as on launching new ventures in Bangladesh and the Middle East.
2. Sukoon
Sukoon.com.pk, a Karachi based online home services providing company successfully closed its seed investment round earlier this year. The startup made it to being one of the highest valued startup at The Nest I/O. The micro-company was also being called as one of the highest valued online company working on providing home repair and service solutions in Pakistan.
The seed investment round was led by Crescent Ventures as the lead investor and was followed by The Indus Entrepreneur (TiE) Islamabad Chapter and DotZero Ventures. This investment happened to be the inaugural one of TiE Islamabad and Crescent Ventures of Crescent Group.The amount acquired remained undisclosed.
3. Engro
Although not a startup, it is important to mention Engro here. FrieslandCampina International Holding BV took-over Engro Foods Limited, which is one of the largest listed companies at the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX), by acquiring a 51% stake in the company. Based on the Pakistani firm’s the-then stock value, the deal was anticipated to bring in a hefty investments of over USD 460 Million. The deal was being called as one of the largest ever deal in the entire private sector of Pakistan.
FrieslandCampina International Holding BV is the world’s largest dairy enterprise based out of Netherlands. The enterprise was formed in 2008 and has offices in 28 countries around the globe with an annual revenue amounting at Euro 11.4 Billion.
4. PerkUp
PerkUp is a Karachi-based startup which provides loyalty and engagement services to businesses and individual consumers. The micro-enterprise successfully raised investments amounting to PKR 1.5 Crore in a seed funding round. The round was being led by DotZero Ventures, followed by Crescent Ventures.
It would be worth mentioning that the investment round brought many dedicated and experienced experts to PerkUp. Bilal Lakhani, the Publisher of…