Fasieh Mehta

Education

Mehta has a computer science background. He attended Y Combinator's Startup School, where participants filled in a weekly dashboard report that included how many people they met. [1]

Career

Mehta says he has been at many organizations at times when great things were happening. He says he has sat through hundreds of pitches over the years. He mentors a startup based in Dubai that sells landscape equipment online. After visiting an export leftover factory, he called the system there stellar and said that, as a computer scientist, he would need about two weeks to learn a system like that. [1]

Views on the Pakistani startup ecosystem

Mehta says the Pakistani startup ecosystem is at a tipping point heading towards great growth, and he believes the overall system is getting better. He said 2021 is the year of fintech disruption and that e-commerce is becoming fairly mature. He said more opportunities are popping up in third party logistics and delivery, and he named telemedicine and tele-diagnosis among the new avenues. He also said the State Bank and SECP have progressive, open minded leadership. [1]

Mehta said high street is unfortunately very small in Pakistan, at 1 to 2 percent, and that exits have been few so far. He described an exit in Pakistan as one of the great success stories that is not well known in the ecosystem. He said he knows people from the second or third generation in business who are thinking of investing outside their conventional business, some as angel investors. He also said some people in government ask for records at every step, that not everyone in government does this, and that many people are frustrated by it. [1]

Views on funding, investors and incubators

Mehta explained seed level funding as money to build an MVP and reach the first paid customers. He said he would bust the myth that you don't need money to make money. He said an ideal startup works without thinking about investors. He said incubation is not a requirement for a successful startup and that most incubators and accelerators in Pakistan do not have a model of taking equity. [1]

Views on building a business

Mehta said the hustling mentality is very important. He said people do not think very big, are not consistent, and lack persistence and perseverance. He said a Pakistani's turn would come only after Zuckerberg, Elon Musk and Bezos. He also said people do not see the six, eight or ten years of hard work someone puts in before reaching a position. [1]

He said one needs to create a platform that can connect to the mass, and that hardly anyone comes and paints a very big vision. He said people must want to be successful as badly as they want to breathe. On selling, he said not to hard sell and that people buy from people before they buy the product. He said that at most one may not manage to build something good but will lay the foundation for someone who comes and builds it better, and that things will not always be the way you wanted, and what you do about it is up to you. [1]

Views on talent, games and streaming

Mehta said Quixel's product is one of the best and that Quixel had the highest number of 3D scanned assets in the world. [1]

He said a student who runs from writing code chooses graphic designing, and he uses the term 'techno-creative people' for such students. He said demand for techno-creative people is high in Scandinavia, China, Japan and Korea, and that Pakistan has many. He said Epic would love more talent here and that they are always scouting for trained, senior resources and very creative, techno-creative people. [1]

Mehta said the flaw he finds is that a Chinese would come to Pakistan, develop a product and make a streaming service that purely Pakistanis run. He said games such as PUBG and Free Fire are putting millions of dollars into the economy. [1]

Outlook for Pakistan

Mehta said he sees Pakistan as very dynamic and driven by young leadership. He said he sees Pakistan focused more on gender equality, with stronger structures and systems. He said Pakistan is a force to be reckoned with because of the power its youth will unlock. He said he has very strong hope for the future, which he attaches to the youth of this nation rather than to politics. [1]

Timeline

2021

Described 2021 as the year of fintech disruption.[1]

Appearances

Frequently asked questions

References

1. Hustle matters more than ideas in Pakistan . Thought Behind Things , 2021-02-17.