In addition to expanding to Lahore and Islamabad, Krave Mart wants to create roughly 8,000 employment locally and launch in key South Asian countries, according to the company’s founder.
In 2021, Pakistan’s embryonic technology sector received more funding than the previous six years combined. Many major VC firms, like Kleiner Perkins, which invested early in Google and Amazon.com Inc., have made new investments in Pakistan.
Traditional e-commerce changed delivery with online ordering, but delivery periods are still 3-5 business days and larger orders are promoted with free shipping. Q-commerce delivers modest orders quickly. It has expanded in the last year as the pandemic encouraged internet purchasing and put a premium on fast food and commodities deliveries from nearby stockrooms or hubs.
Investors include Chinese MSA Capital, Russian ru-Net, German Global Founders Capital, and Islamabad-based Zayn Capital. A number of strategic angel investors and venture capital firms joined the round.
“The cash will be used to establish up over 100 supply hubs across Pakistan,” founder and CEO Kassim Shroff said Monday.
Former Daraz, Foodpanda, and Swvl executives co-founded Krave Mart in November. It is currently used in five parts of Karachi and will soon be in 12. The business uses a hub and spoke strategy to ensure delivery within 10 minutes in Karachi.
The hub and spoke model refers to a distribution mechanism where a centralised “hub” originates or receives everything for dissemination to customers. From the hub, products are transported to company-owned spokes for additional processing and distribution.
We intend to cover all Karachi residents by the end of January 2022,” Shroff remarked. “We would start operations in Lahore and then move to Islamabad by January or February 2022.”
The business intends to create 8,000 employment once it has 100 hubs in Pakistan’s major cities.
“Each hub produces jobs for roughly 80 people,” Shroff remarked. It would also provide massive job prospects, he noted.
The Krave Mart CEO claimed the company planned to expand to Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, and Nepal. “We aim to expand into South Asia.”
Two new e-commerce startups have raised over $300 million in the capital this year in Pakistan’s startup ecosystem.
Bookme, the country’s largest online travel and ticketing marketplace, raised $7.5 million in its Series A round. Bagallery, beauty and fashion firm, raised $4.5 million in a similar round. Zayn Capital, Lakson Venture Capital, and Hayaat Global led both rounds.
In Pakistan, e-commerce accounts for only 2% of GDP, compared to 20% in Indonesia. Daraz Group, Pakistan’s largest e-commerce company, intends to quadruple its retail volume per year for the next five years, according to Bloomberg.
