Pakistan's IT exports won't scale on cheap labour anymore

They weren't necessarily जो मेरी understanding थी कि जो कि, आपको immediately problem solve करती हुई नज़र आएंगी. I'm not saying startups होनी नहीं चाहिए. I just think कि आजकल के time के ऊपर Pakistan को बहुत सारी different चीज़ों की requirement है and startups शायद एक different time, एक different phase में definitely Pakistan देखेगा और आएंगी भी. But आज की इस conversation के लिए हमने फिर सोचा कि startups हम थोड़ा ऊपर जाते हैं. Try to speak to someone that actually, you know, funds startups वह इस वक़्त क्या सोच रहे हैं? वह क्या startups को सीधा ना देख रहे जिस तरह मैं देख रहा हूं. वह overall industry को किस्ता देखते इसके लिए हमारे साथ मौजूद हैं. ऐसेन जमील who is the managing partner at SY Ventures, the founding manager managing partner if I'm not wrong. ऐसेन, thank you so much for being part of the show. Thank you for having me. ऐसेन, I'm gonna start off just trying to understand very basic. इस वक़्त आप क्या देख रहे हैं? हमने देखा कि दो हज़ार उन्नीस से लेकर दो हज़ार बाइस तक post करीम के acquisition एक gold rush हुआ, Pakistan में भी हुआ, पूरी दुनिया में भी हुआ और you know it was all about the startup frenzy, millions of dollars की investment हो रही है. हम expect कर रहे हैं. हर अगले साल बड़े से बड़े से बड़ा cycle आएगा. And then 22 it all stops. The biggest names collapse. Industry पूरी की पूरी जो है ना बेचारी वह धर्म भरम हो गई. And so, people are very confused कि क्या यह एक bubble था? Bubble burst हो गया? That's it? या हमें थोड़ा सा pivot करने की ज़रूरत थी? What's the state of startup industry in Pakistan right now?

So, I think startups are going through a correction. A lot of the correction has happened. So, combination of things happened, why twenty two, twenty three May we saw a bunch of problems and they happen in various cycles. One, capital constraints take global market, obviously, you know about that. The way startups were valuing themselves locally compared to regional players, there were some fundamental problems there, and there was a little bit of a gold rush, and everybody wanted to jump into that space. So I think work correction mechanism, a lot of that has happened. Some of it is happening. And what we're seeing now in the in the startup space is is a resolution of a problem we saw in '22, which was really technology centric. So in '22, we saw a bunch of startups, some, you know, we give them feedback that your technology value addition isn't there, and you need to focus on that. Yes. The business problem exists. The digitization need exists, but let's try and solve that through really global, you know, global type technology solutions. So because of our capital थोड़ा flow cut up in that space and a lot of startups were being formed and going very fast without spending enough time on the technology aspect, Both थोड़ी से flaws, they जो अब I feel have been corrected. So things we're seeing now for those startups that did, remain in the space and growing for the new ones that are coming in, they are addressing that problem. So with capital flow becoming a little better and startups having learned, I think this phase will see companies that will capture the local market through true technology innovation in this space. So, I think वह जो correction mechanism है वह अब completion की तरफ़ जा रहा है and now we're seeing some of those problems.

Makes sense. आपने technology value addition की बात की and इसके अंदर अगर मैं एक average end user के perspective से देखूं, तो यह बड़ी interesting है because अगर हम fintech space में देखें तो you know you got the the easy पैसा and the jazz caches even जो आपकी food pandas and a lot of these locally produced technologies, apps इसमें बड़े basic किस्म के कभी कभी brain dead किस्म के मसले मुझे आए. मेरे मैं जब And then you saw सादा पर, right? Someone कोई बाहर से आया उठकर उसने आकर एक बहुत ही simple, clean, technology first product design की, develop की, ज़्यादा marketing पर इतना time नहीं जाया गया, जितना ज़्यादा उसने उस experience पर time लगाया and then उसने eventually exit भी किया. Probably the only success story जो कि Pakistan में exist है. वह एक बाहर का गोरा आया, उसने आकर बनाया बनाकर के वह निकल गया. I really want to understand because you quickly mentioned technology value addition. For those who don't understand जो tech industry के नहीं है, what do you mean by that?

Well, you see, lot of people who find a business problem, they want a digital solution और अगर आप B2C space में होते हैं तो that's the app experience, right? And so people work, a lot of founders work on the app experience, primarily trying to keep it simple, trying to keep it straight. But if the foundational technology underneath that is not architected and designed in the right way, so it creates two types of problems. One, your app experience with every edition will break. You know, so problems are opni fees key or other users face, and they don't get fixed fast enough. It's because the foundational technology underneath that application wasn't designed to standards that we would expect. Right? The second and the more bigger problem that happens with poor tech foundational technology is that you cannot enable features and you cannot grow and compete in the long run. So every time आप enhancements करते हैं उस application में technology में वह एक बहुत बड़ा project बनता है. और शुरू में तो it's very simple. But imagine that you have 10,000,000 users on your application in the B2C business. And now you need to fundamentally change something or you need to enable something new. If you've not architected it with the right principles and need, that's going to be a massive project, which means you will be slow, your users will be affected, and so on and so forth. So when I say the foundational technology focus needed to be there and that was part of the correction, it's honing in on the fact that, yes, our business problem solves, creates will capitalize, creates. The way you go about doing this as a startup has to be very technology focused. And in fact, I'd say most of the companies we saw in the beginning where we did not invest and give that feedback, not about the business case, the valuations, the multipliers. It was that, you know, if you were going to beat your incumbent who's got other advantages, you must be better than them in technology.

And because that's where we are investing. And that's the things you also have to be good at, but you can be second fiddle on technology. And that's where I feel a lot of the problem has been in the in the start of space in the first phase of it. Makes sense. मुझे थोड़ा सा यह बताइएगा. We've we've seen in Pakistan. We created talent चाहे वह बहुत massive amounts में ना हो, but we've been able to create talent that has I mean you're a पाकिस्तानी who ended up working for Fortune 500 companies while growing up in Pakistan. Right? Eventually education के लिए आप बाहर चले गए. मेरे अपने भाई सारे के सारे, they're all, you know, big tech. Pakistan से educate करके मुझे यह जो distance आता है ना मुझे इसकी समझ नहीं आई क्योंकि why is it पाकिस्तानी working in global spaces can create world class products? लेकिन technology जब हमारी startup की industry आ रही थी तो technology was fairly poor and it didn't make a lot of sense to me because this is a this is a place जहां पर आपके पास world class talent sporadically ही but available तो है ना और और और funding भी आप बड़ी अच्छी amount की raise कर रहे हैं. तो क्या आपको लगता है कि focus नहीं था, उसके बाद पैसा इतना लगाया नहीं जा रहा था कि talent वह quality का higher नहीं हो रहा था? या do you think there was some other reason why technology was just never a focus for a lot of these startups?

I think it's partly based on need. So जब एक एक, like, for example, logistics आती, Right? So if there's no if there are applications in that place that exist in the local market, the founder is aspiring doing an iterative approach. What is the minimum viable product that we need to create to start capturing? Because you have investor capital. You've you've got all these factors where you want to show show progress. तो वह जो build की approach खाली short term होती है तो वह बहुत basic market capture point of view से होती है, right? Like, let's get going. You know, a lot of people use the word agile, a lot of people use an iterative approach as an excuse for just building things quickly. जब वही लोग, वही talent जब global side पर जाता है ना तो वहां पर भी technology evolution is farther along, especially like like your family and and brothers are working in large organizations or whatnot in the b b space, ARPIC technology has already progressed at a certain point. So their targets are even higher. So that exposure and that expectation of that market forces you to be very innovative and creative and and and sort of abstract in your technology design. यहां पर क्योंकि technology evolution और startup evolution early stage भी थी, so एक बंदा जैसे कभी भी एक ride in the order key from any application, right, we'll need a very basic thing, you know, so so you can start capturing market. But that approach to me where if you look at where the rest of the world's technology ecosystem is, is very short sighted. Yes, you should have an iterative approach to get going. But the foundation to your earlier question, the foundation has to be such कि आपको multiple iterations की वजह से आप tech debt ना create करें. Tech debt is a big problem with short term approaches. Global markets which have product बना रहे हो or you're working the Fortune 500 space, especially in the Fortune 500 type space, they're solving problems and innovating at scale, you know, which is sort of top of the line technology. So, skinny, that exposure. So the same people who go over there are exposed by with it to a different type of demand from technology, and they are obviously in a network where they're already, you know, at parity with global standards. So, next phase की ही build करते हैं. हम यहां पर build करते हैं, हमने शुरू में build किया है, was very basic stuff and this is not just a problem in startups, it's been a problem the services side as well. It it's sort of a very low hanging fruit type approach which is fine to get going as long as you have your eye on the price and and want to capture the the, you know, all the biggest problems in in the text. Makes sense.

Pakistan में जो हम देखते ना technology के rules, a lot of young people are just like, चलो हमने tech में घुसना है, हमने jobs figure out करनी है, हमने काम उसमें करना है. तो you hear stuff like, you know, engineers, data engineering, you know, Python सीख ली, उस पर आ गए या queue analysts हो गए वगैरह वगैरह. And काफ़ी दफ़ा a lot of these people when they're working in services industries within Pakistan तो वह back offices में हैं. Right? So thinking काम नहीं है उनका. वह एक गोरा है या कोई बाहर का बंदा है जिसने architecture बनाया, जिसने जिसने client या या end user को समझा, उसके around एक architecture बनाया. उसके बाद उसने कहा कि यार भाई यह यह जोड़ दो. Right? And so, there is a big distance between actually identifying problem in a real world use case scenario and then converting that into technology. And जो एक sort of product management का role होता है ना for a lot of people within the tech space in Pakistan, they have no idea कि यार, how do you sit between the intersection of technology and real world and be able to create something that actually solves problems? Why do you think we haven't been able to create those roles? And do you think those, like, आपकी अपनी companies हैं, portfolio companies उसमें, do you think you've you've found it hard to find quality product managers in Pakistan compared to let's say I'm I'm quite certain कि आपको tech के तो बड़े smart लोग मिल गए होंगे जो कि किसी technology को champion करके उससे सब कुछ कर सकते हैं. But really identifying the real world problem and then creating solutions around it, Were you able to find good talent for that as well? आप लोगों ने पाक्तानी stock market तो देखी होगी it is right now on an all time high. मैंने कुछ ऐसा पहले अपनी video के अंदर बताया था कि Pakistan की economy up and down हो रही है लेकिन stock market is going to correct itself. It is going to give you great returns और आज हमने वह होता हुआ अभी देख लिए but still अगर हम dollar में देखें तो stock market अभी भी discount में है. अब जाहिर है आप में से बहुत सारे लोग सोच रहे होंगे कि यार stock market में पैसा तो बनाना है, समझ भी आ गई है लेकिन कैसे बनाया जाए? तो I have great news for you because सरमाया ने अपनी नई product Zer by सरमाया launch की है जहां पर आप अपनी तमाम investments को track कर सकते हैं चाहे वह investments in stocks हों, physical currencies हों, mutual funds हों या gold हों और अगर आपने अभी तक अपनी investment journey start नहीं की और आपको यह सब कुछ बहुत complicated लगता है तो you can also check out the trainings by समाया. उसमें वह starters के लिए capital markets की training देते जिसमें आपको exactly समझ आएगा कि यह सब कुछ काम किस तरह करता है और कौन सी सही चीज़ है जिसमें आप invest कर सकते हैं. For And those जो कि investments कर चुके हैं लेकिन उनको losses हुए हैं they can take the technical analysis master class जहां पर वह आपको expert techniques बताएंगे कि किस तरीके से आपने ensure करना है कि आपका loss minimal हो और आपके returns maximum हो. So check out and the trainings in the link down below. Happy investing.

Yeah. I mean, to answer your question, I think, again, the the need for coders, was anticipated to go down years in advance. So, I mean, I'm talking twenty sixteen, 'seventeen, Global Fortune January, wherein the foundation of data layers was being implemented, everybody foresaw that AI tools and other tools will eliminate the need for some basic quarters, Right? The the type of work that we had always pursued, which was, the thinking that come is being done, by someone else, and they're simply passing on to you and saying, go code this. So you're not problem solving. You're you're coding and figuring out what problem is being solved. Nobody's coming to you with a problem statement and saying, hey. I want to develop a personalization platform, that's can, you know, scale to 10,000 transactions per second. Go help me. How do we do this? Right? And here are all the real world scenarios that we should think through. Nobody's coming with a basic problem of two two companies in in Pakistan primarily. And that's fundamentally the problem we're trying to solve. So, our portfolio companies, were doing a lot of work in the beginning that was really, I would say, HR ish. Meaning you take Talid and you bid for work and you're lying there and you make money because we are at a low cost, you know, low cost center. But that work is not going to exist for long. Right? So what you really need to pursue, like you said, is structuring companies, tech companies, or even product companies in Pakistan that are solving global problems. So to solve global problems, first, you need to understand where the global solution is already. You need to have exposure to the global solution. You need to understand it so you can build ahead of that. Our problem here at IITPT is that because we've been able to make money in the past by doing simple and easy work, we have sort of stuck and try to horizontally scale that problem. That solution, sorry. What we needed to do is start transitioning towards global valuation much earlier. And and, obviously, you know, as as investors, we're doing that in our company where our companies are now not saying, hey. My cost is x. Give me work on y, I make this money and I'm done. Now they are being structured in position to go talk to global Fortune 1,000 companies and say, hey, give us your problem. We'll deal with the costing later. That is a nice to have advantage. But the real advantage is because we can provide you a solution that that competes with the rest of the world, right? Where you're going to extract the type of value and growth that you're looking for. फिर बात आती है cost. Cost becomes an icing on the cake. Cost should not be the driver of doing business. Because उसमें क्या होता है then the the non Fortune 1,000 word comes and says I just want cheap labor. Here's what you need to do. We've done the thinking. We'll figure it out. वह तो eventually मतलब that works just going to die. In five years time आपके AI tools ऐसे होंगे that, you know, two year olds can go in. And I think already so many younger people can just go and do all the basic tech work without needing any technical. You don't need to know Python. You don't need to know any of the the coding languages. You can just simply be a good thinker and and use those tools. So that's not the work we want to target. We've sort of missed the opportunity of creating the foundational layer that continuously bids for high value. That's the part that I think we're trying to catch up on now. Makes sense. Can you tell me some of the companies? Like,

अगर उनके नाम क्या करती हैं that you've invested in? What were they doing before? What are they doing now?

Yeah, sure. We made a couple of those companies public. I can speak on them. So one is CodeNinja, and they were a company that were basically a services company. And when we started working with them, they were doing partly basic work, but had very strong aspirations to move from doing basic work to doing complex value addition work, which was a key reason why we, you know, invested in them. And so today, they're doing work in artificial intelligence. They're doing work in cloud computing. They're creating new frameworks. They're creating enterprise level POC solutions. So they're in the B2B space. हम invest करते हैं in companies जो frontier technology work, which, you know, you've heard of AI, cloud, blockchain, complex data structures में काम करें and they work and aspire to work with Fortune 1,000 companies, right? Problem solving And our companies are all working with enterprise clients, and our fund and investment is basically very export focused. So we do, some of our companies will take a local client, but they have to be very large, like a huge bank or someone that needs a solution, in this space. But largely their exposure is outside Pakistan where they're taking on complex work and bidding against, you know, some global giants in that space.

Interesting. इसमें दो चीज़ें particularly मुझे बड़ी interesting लगी हैं. पहला तो यह है कि आपने बोला export focused, right? और जो मेरा pain point रहा है with the startup industry historically as it has been placed is that a lot of them have been, you know, they've gotten global exposure and so even investors अगर हों या founders हों तो वह यह कह रहे कि we'll come solve Pakistan's problems, in the digital space जो कि बड़ा मुश्किल काम है. Already, you know, आपके लिए उसको एक infrastructure भी चाहिए जिसके ऊपर build करना आसान है. बाहर आपको infrastructure आसानी से मिल जाता But even more importantly, जब आप बाहर का dollar packed capital लेकर आ रहे हैं और उसको आप एक ऐसी market में invest कर रहे हैं जो कि year on year lose कर रही है और उस market को जब आप analyze करते हैं तो उसको largely जो requirement है वह export की है. Largely उसको dollar increase की requirement है largely उसको require requirement है कि वह globalize करें अपने आप को. तो वहां पर उन उनका मुझे वह समझ नहीं आता. But on the other hand आपने कहा कि, you know, as a as a venture capitalist, you're focusing on export focused companies. How does that work out? Because historically whenever I've spoken to an investor, वह जो scale चाहिए होता है venture capitalist को, वह एक market से मिलता है. Right? वह कहते कि यार हम Pakistan में आऐंगे, Pakistan में यह build करेंगे उसमें planning 100,000,000 हमारा consumer हो जाएगा और फिर हमारी इतनी 10,000 billion dollar की invest valuation हो जाएगी. On the other hand, export is very slow, steady. You know, quickly आपने deploy किया और quickly आपने उसके returns लिए और आपने profitability दिखाई versus the historical model of how startups were approached. थोड़ा सा यह मुझे बताइएगा कि how how do you differentiate between what was happening and what you're doing now?

Yeah. So so, do you're the earlier part of your questions about was, you know, bringing in foreign direct investment or or global capital and investing in the local market. So we we invest local capital. As a as a guiding principle, it was a foundational principle, actually, that's noncompromisable for us. So, जो जो हमारा thesis था was you've got to deploy local capital and local talent to go market capture global revenue. Because वहां पर जब, as you know, जब rupee to dollar fluctuate करता है, तो हमें बहुत advantage होता है, right? Because because if you bring in dollar, let's say, 100 rupees and you've invested here, now dollar to rupee changes to 300 and your consumer market for whatever you're selling is is local, that creates a lot of pressure. That a lot of pressure for not only just the investor but more so for the startup themselves because उनकी जो strategic direction होती है ना, वह returns drive करने की होती है. So अब अब return expectation जब switch कर जाती है and what they do is they start making strategic decisions that are very high risk, you know, and they sell the decision saying, look, we are focused on returning investor capital. Now we're going to take riskier bets. And that is not how you do business. For us, the principal back in 'twenty one, 'twenty two was, can we have to galvanize local capital? And if we invest in something that is getting local returns, fine. But our preference was obviously investing in local capital for export, you know, where where we want to be. Now a a challenge here कि हमारा अभी export exposure बहुत low है, like three to 4,000,000,000, 5,000,000,000. You know, the numbers range depending on which aspect you want to look at. हमारे पास इस वक्त globally with the advent of AI, and this is a fun part about technology, because every ten years there's a shift, right? You had the age of the Internet, you had the age of video, you have the age of data. Now you're in the age of AI. So there's another, you know, 5 to $1,010,000,000,000,000 dollars of of opportunity available in the next seven to eight years. You know? We're, like, a drop in the bucket. With 5,000,000,000, it's it's nothing. Right? It doesn't even, like, count. So for us to go from five to, say, 50 should not be that much of a challenge. We know companies जो individually उतना business करते हैं, you know? So so for us, they it made complete sense कि हम local capital, local talent इस global opportunity capture करें और वह इतनी small हमारा जो जो bump up है वह इतना थोड़ा है कि we don't spine कि, you know, there we will be competing and and have many challenges from going from five to 50 as an economy if we do this right. Yes, when you start crossing 500,000,000,000 to a trillion, now you've got more competition paying seat as attention to. लेकिन अभी हम तो इतने छोटे हैं कि इस journey के लिए तो it should be frankly

a foregone conclusion if we just do a few things right. Makes sense And again, वही वाली बात है कि जब आप dollar को PKR में लेकर आते उससे value निकालने कोशिश करते तो बहुत सारे सवाल आ जाते हैं whereas vice versa suddenly the economy actually supports you in in in this context. And so थोड़ा सा मुझे इसके बारे में बताइएगा. How does this work? आपने कहा हम local capital को mobilize करते हैं और उसको invest करते हैं. So, for an average user, वह यह देखता है कि उसके पास opportunity to invest Pakistan में अगर वह देखता है तो जाहिर वह real estate की fileओं में जाता है. थोड़ा सा उससे अगर दादा आगे निकल जाता है तो वह कहता है कि मैं stock market में invest कर लूंगा. Stock market में भी फिर वह जाहिर है कि चूंकि आपने economy की सिम्त को समझ लिया तो लोग कह रहे कि चलो यार हम inter loop में export focus, dollar packed incentive structure government का exist नहीं करता. पहले तो मुझे यह बताइएगा कि did you, like, go around your own set of network and ask them to invest? इसको कोई कोई is there some sort of an institutionalization that has been done in the venture capitalist or या वह क्या करेंगे? वह जाएंगे कोई restaurant खोलेंगे, कोई कोई dumb business बनाएंगे जो उसका उनका कोई exposure नहीं है and 99% of that will fail and so it's inefficient flow of capital. क्या मुज़मिल जा सकता है और कह

So so as an investor, जो as a venture capitalist, as as people who create funds, हम local capital galvanize करते हैं. So, one of the things people talk about with me is what are our biggest challenges? You know, because हमने अपना डेढ़ एक साल complete किया है. God's been kind. Our companies have done really well. But, you know, who we let in on into the fund, it's not just about the amount of capital you put in. We want a certain type of people in this space, you know. अब हमने structure किया हुआ है कि auto companies are profitable, you know, all that local capital risk appetite हम meet कर रहे होते But is it available today to invest in साई if you, let's say, have बजाज सात? We're probably not because, you know, we want a certain it's hard for us to manage too many LPs. We want a limited number of LPs जो कि certain check size पर अंदर आते हैं. Eventually, हमारी aspiration है is to be able to put something in the public market where small investors are able to buy units in a fund who then are are pegged against these companies. But we're not there today. हमारा ecosystem, हमारा financial ecosystem, हमारा investment ecosystem अभी इतना evolve नहीं किया at least for the the type of companies we're doing. But we eventually have, you know, my partners and I talk about this because we'd love a person जो कि पांच दस लाख रुपए भी डाल रहा है in a space to be able to come to this opportunity. You know, because वह macro में भी help करते उस week. We're not there today. What I'm trying to understand is, is it a ticket size problem or is it a trust problem also कि अभी हम complete stranger को नहीं ले रहे. हम,

you know, recommendation के ऊपर कोई बंदा आता है और आकर कहता है कि यार मैं x amount डालना चाहता हूं. आपके ticket size पूरा तो रखता तो आप उसको लेंगे. Stranger with even a bigger ticket size you probably wouldn't take because I understand, you know, आप Pakistan में आपने demand creation भी करनी है. वह investor आ गया, पैसे डाल दिया. अब तीन महीने बाद वह आपका आकर बोलना शुरू हो गया कि यार करो आपका model शायद हो सकता है. फ़र्क हो, long term हो. तो इस वक़्त where do you stand?

I I would say it's an it's a management problem. Meaning कि it is easy to to cater to the needs of 20 individuals and small institutions than it is to cater to 200 because we don't want to lower how the best practices and how to be prospective investors. Right? But when you have a five pool of 500 investors, that's a very different sort of management we have to do. I don't think, you know, size and institution is there today to be able to cater to 500 people. I think it's more us than anything else. Because trust is actually शुनीना, right? Because people give capital, you know, you have great term sheets, you know, how to manage that. So it's it's not a matter of trust because As long as the ticket size is there, you're fine too. Yeah, because we we think that we will be able to manage better a smaller people of invest, a small number of investors, जिनको हम वह services provide कर सकते हैं, उनको वह चीज़ें दे सकते हैं जो because you have to understand that in our in our space, it's it's trailblazing. Anybody who's coming in our in our space has either done very little technology investment has definitely not done in the private markets. You know, public markets, कर लेते हैं systems into loop and whatnot. But private markets, well, they're very few. And we've got a bunch of investors in Pakistan, जो कि first phase of startups में they've been hurt a little bit, right? So the bar is really high in terms of what we want to give them back so their confidence is is there. So I think it's a it's a a matter of just us being able to manage, you know, a certain number of people. Makes sense. मुझे यह बताएं कि आपकी जो generally

जिस किस्म की companies Code Ninja को अगर मैं उठाऊं या जो आपने जिस तरह से बोला कि export focus, product, services बना रही हैं, scale रही हैं. What's the model here for you? Are you looking at कि यार मैं इसमें invest कर रहा हूं और invest करके मैं eventually कोई exit लूंगा जिससे मैं multiplier निकालूंगा? या are you coming in and thinking कि भाई यह अच्छी company है, इनके margins अच्छे हैं, I can actually help structure them in a way कि वह अपने margins या value ज़्यादा निकाल सकते हैं and I'll take the piece of a pie at the end of every year. Right? Because जो जो standard startup model है या venture capitalist model है, उसमें तो जो दुनिया भर में हम देखते रहे हैं, वह तो यह है कि यार एक बहुत ही छोटे footprint के ऊपर, एक बहुत बढ़िया आपने company बना ली और उसमें आपने उसको बड़ा करने के लिए you need a lot of money. So, investment की requirement भी question mark है ना कि for let's say Uber करीम वह उनके marketing budgets इतने ज़्यादा हैं, उन्होंने outreach इतने ज़्यादा करनी है. मेरे लिए बड़ा confusing होगा कि Code Ninja को एक time तो शायद चाहिए वह investment ताकि वह कुछ investment कर ले अपने office के अंदर, hardware ख़रीद ले, वगैरह वगैरह. But क्या उनको continuous investment चाहिए? क्या उनको multiple rounds चाहिए? किस किस purpose के लिए वह investment ले रहे हैं? And so, मुझे ज़्यादा it seems to me कि यह private equity style business है rather than venture capitals, VC style. Right? So how would you differentiate yourself and why why do you choose to call yourself a VC firm rather than a, let's say, private equity firm? Yeah. So so I don't believe

fundamentally in predefined notions of anything. Right? यह words define करते हैं कि बंदे को क्या होना चाहिए? So we just go on guiding principles and objectives and you can call that method and model whatever you feel. Right? So so but but just on a go to it, not a lighter. But on a serious note, we explain ourselves, our our model, as a mix of private equity and venture. So we take elements of of venture investing, and we take elements of private equity investing and we've combined. When I look at our model, it wasn't defined कि हमने यह इधर से लेना है. It just made the most sense for us as investors knowing the opportunity, knowing where companies are and knowing the appetite of risk. हमने यह सारे elements को study करके वह model बनाया जो जो the type of companies we invest in, हम उनकी valuation कैसे करते हैं, how do we position them, how do we how do we structure them. So so we're sort of I think in between both of those models. We are very growth focused. So even though we are investing in companies that are profitable and could be give dividends tomorrow, we're not taking dividends out because we are very focused on capturing large market share of these multi trillion AI frontier tech world that is opening up in the B2B space. So that's very venture style strategic decisions. But at the same time, we have optionality, you know, made in our deals where if tomorrow we did want to give dividends because it made the most sense for the company and us. We could execute that. So हम जो स्थलंकी deal structure करते हैं और रिश्तान को structure करते हैं keeps it takes into account the opportunity, the the our our goals as well as the risk appetite of us as investors. Because we want to sort of win everything. Right? It should not be a choice one or the other. It's one and the other. And it's just about balancing those those things. But that's how we kinda kinda structure deals and and go forward. That makes sense. मेरा जो again इसका एक छोटा context अगर मैं दूं I want your additional thought on that. For

a lot of again firms वह जो historically जो problem आया ना pump and dump वाला कि जिसमें आप आए और आपने कहा कि यार यह लो extra capital लो, किसी तरीके से अपने numbers को बढ़ाओ ताकि मैं अगले chump को जो है एक multiplier पर बेचकर निकल जाऊं. Mhmm. यहां पर जो आपका model है इसमें क्या ऐसा model है जो कि जिसमें आपने कहीं ना कहीं exit लेने और exit पर पैसे कमाने हैं या आप कह रहे कि ok I'm growth focused, sure. But eventually, you know, this is a great company. I wanna stick around and I wanna make sure कि चलो एक time पर जब growth, let's say, tattoo हो गई या you know, whatever the circumstances are तो मैं उसमें फिर dividend के ऊपर, like, the model actually says कि मैं जितना मैंने पैसा डाला है मैं dividend के ऊपर भी अच्छा return निकाल सकता हूं rather than जब तक मैं you know इसको multiply करके अगले को नहीं बेचता तो मेरा तो कोई पैसा बने नहीं रहा. Mhmm mhmm. So let me uptake earlier question because I wanna answer that really quickly as well in terms of the the the CNS A, CNS B, CNS D. In my personal opinion, whether startups or or any industry,

Pakistan की market is not so so big enough that you can have all these multiple rounds across multiple. Sure, we'll have some examples of that happening, but it's not going to happen often enough. So whenever I meet companies, I usually tell them that if your strategy is is about raising money five times to become a company that's going to be valued fundamentally, that's not going to work today. So you can have one round, one and a half round at max. You can raise more money if you can convince the investor that it's going to be put to good use and the multiplier on that is x, y, z. That's fine. But you can't sell the story that we're gonna do this seven times because buying and fluidity is not many today. It will be there in three to four years, but it's not there today. So so coming back to the companies and how we make money, we have all the options on the table. So one just आपने बताया है कि we invest in company, we grow them. But we love it so much as investors that we're like, hey, the company doesn't need to go raise capital from the public market. Company is doing really well. We are operational investors, so we're continuing to add value. The relationship is good. We'll go on the dividend model. We could. Right? But we also have the exit space, which is, yes, in in x number of years, our company wants to go public. In that place, we have an opportunity to to have a lump sum exit or a mix of that. So, how many structures we have all optionality. Ultimately, our number one focus is always the company. So, the pecking order, when we talk to these companies who are working the B2B space, make it very clear that every decision will be made to for in the best interest of the company for the goal that we're trying to align with you on. We're noncompromisable. Company के बाद आते हैं clients, clients investors, founders, you know, employees all of that is below the company. So, हम हम एक relationship जब इनके साथ build करते हैं वह एक journey पर हमारे साथ है. Because I'm I'm a fairly operational investor. To your earlier question, उनका exposure नहीं होता. A lot of our companies don't have exposure to Fortune 1,000 and we bring a lot of that structuring, keeping the client in mind. And obviously, we connect them to markets, we fuel them with capital, we give them everything required to compete in that space. So हमारा जो जो model होता है उनके साथ engagement का is not the come in, I'm going to buy and just like exit or in exchange make money. That's not it. It's about making the next best five to seven companies in Pakistan period. The best technology companies और उसमें हमने flexibility होती है हमारे पास, in some cases dividend ले लेंगे, in some cases हम exit करेंगे. All is about what the company is. उसके साथ साथ हम investor भी उसके साथ ही चलेंगे. There's no separate path नहीं warm करेंगे. मुझे यह बताएं कि

जब मैं IT industry के लोगों से बात कर रहा था तो उन्होंने कहा कि यार one of the reasons why Pakistan is unable to tap into high value work जिसमें आप let's say price अपने आप को अच्छा कर सकते हैं वगैरह वगैरह. तो वह यह कहते कि यार scale matters, right? India में जब tata जाता है और जाकर वह let's say Microsoft के किसी project के ऊपर bid करता है और वह कहता यार हमें हम आपको दो हज़ार बना देंगे और उसके वजह से इतना let's say billions का एक एक contract है long term. तो Microsoft trust कर सकता है because of the like 2,000 people is let's say 1% of the scale, right? Of that company and so they know they can manage it. Pakistan में हमारे पास क्योंकि हर बंदे ने एक डेढ़ियों की मस्जिद बनाई भी है and कोई like let's say अगर हैं भी इतने सारे छोटे छोटे sort of boutiques, software houses तो या तो वह MLAs करें और वह जो है अपने आप को एक consolidated front लेकर जाएं किसी के सामने. Otherwise छोटी छोटी जो यह boutique outlets हैं वह किसी छोटे से problem पर तो काम कर सकते हैं but किसी भी बड़े solution की तरफ़ वह नहीं जा सकते and then they lose value. Would you agree to that? Because you're talking about high value but with at this point in time the scale isn't that much in Pakistan. Right? And so the company itself is not necessarily ideally positioned to compete with global talent.

Mhmm. That has been a exact a big problem in the past. You know, so in 2023, I was talking to someone in Cisco, and obviously, I had a rapport with them. And if I was backing a company in Pakistan, they would be very open to listen to that, but they needed 500 people. Right? Now bringing 500 people for one client on a project is a complicated problem. So that was legitimately a problem. I'll speak from our portfolio perspective. We do get clients that require a lot of people or maybe competencies that don't exist in single companies. जब वह हमारे portfolio में होती हैं, they do work together. But that's a very small solution. The bigger problem that you're identifying with these Fortune 100 companies in particular, उनकी teams दोस्तों, teams और चार सौ बोलेसे कम बहुत ही नहीं when they try to solve the problem because it's it's at a very, large scale. That is a reason why some of the पाकिस्तानी companies aren't able to get it, right? Because they simply haven't grown and invested. जब हम invest करते हैं, we build large ventures in these companies. We we build talent. So, lot of our capital goes in creating that strength, you know, so they can go after this way. But the more interesting thing, उज़ाबाद, that's happening is that large organizations now जो solutions मांगनी उनकी इतने ज़्यादा लोग नहीं चाहिए. It no longer is it the 2,000 tens where they need a thousand person team to come in and build an ERP system. They don't need, you know, five other people to do integrations. Because of AI, the advent of all these tools in place, smaller, more nimble teams are able to service larger clients as long as they have the problem solving mindset and the ability to integrate across systems. अगर वह चीज़ exist करती है ना as a as an experience. So जब हम अपनी companies का काम करते हैं, companies are focusing very heavily on the architect layer more so than the quarter layer because quarters आपको अब वह ratio one to 10 का नहीं चाहिए. You need like, you know, two quarters to an architect for example. You don't need that many And like that, जो जो मेरे peers in The US and the large enterprises, they're not looking for for, you know, 500%. Sure sure, Fortune 100 is still maybe looking at that space, but America में जैसे different market में अगर आप Fortune 1,000 में जाए, they're like nine hundred ninety ninth company is doing, you know, $50,000,000 of revenue. So they're still very large for us. So so we don't have to say necessarily in the Fortune 100. We can be in the Fortune 500 to a thousand to start, you know? और उस scale को अब हम meet कर लेती हैं. But अगर आप मुझसे पूछेंगे कि, like, if all of them came to parts and wanted to business, no, we we're not scaled there yet. But it's an iterative approach to try and get to that that number or that business.

Makes sense. A lot of the, let's say, boutiques, tech companies और और और और उसमें सिर्फ़ यह नहीं है कि वह headcount बेचने वाली है. उसमें products भी बना रही हैं. छोटी छोटी web apps type बनाकर के अच्छा revenue generate कर रही हैं. Services, agencies बनी हुई हैं. If I were to ask them कि यार did you ever think about raising capital? तो कभी उनके दिमाग़ में भी नहीं आता. क्योंकि वह यह देखते हैं वह कहते हैं यार हमारे पास जो revenue है versus जो costs हैं उसमें revenue पर हमारे पास इतना ही space है कि हमने अगर let's say एक certain scale पर ऐसा ऐसा grow करना है तो हम करते रहेंगे and so it doesn't make a lot of sense and again this ties to what I asked you earlier कि then where is that money going? Like, आपको बड़ा clearly समझ आ रहा Let's say air left है. Air left आपको समझ आ रहा है या warehouse ख़रीदना है. माल उठाना है market से, riders को mobilize करना है. पहले आपने सारे stakeholders को mobilize करना है before you can start creating revenue and creating a model. But for running companies जिसके अंदर आप जाकर invest कर रहे हैं, where is that money going? And more importantly, do you think only money is there there? Yeah. You mentioned involvement earlier. You said I'm very heavily involved with these people as well. Right? So, is it a mix of, yes, the money is there because a lot of people that oftentimes require the money, but more than the money, we're actually bringing in an institutional knowledge base, that actually, scales you where, you know, आपको फ़ायदा होता है? Yeah. It's the latter.

It's it's actually they're all profitable. Right? Our companies make money. So it's not a money problem. They obviously need to learn how to spend that and what to spend on. But it is really the institutional knowledge and the client perspectives and the restructuring to global best practices that we focus on. So we are an operational investor. We spend a lot of time with these companies, that's how these companies grow. Operational cap so so capital really helps. So so to answer that question first, when you are working with the Fortune one thousand companies, you need a certain runway RFP key cost. It takes months or weeks to engage with them. You need to invest, show them proof of concept. So there's an investment of capital required to capture that business. The business development is done in a certain way, which also requires capital. But the most important and collaborative relation as an investor we have is really about positioning them in that space. And that starts from a lot of it is actually focused inwards, not outputs, which is how are you going to structure your people? What type of comprehension skills are you putting in place? What type of architecture skills are you putting in place? How are the problem solving? We do a lot of simulations, with them so they understand que problem will deal with them. Because we've equipped them to deal with directors and above in the Fortune 1,000 space. And because those are the people that will make decisions. How do you engage with that, with a person who's got a problem at hand in that space and needs a solution partner? उसकी जो positioning में time spend करती और उसको हमें institutionalize करना होता because we can't go in and say, hey, let's make 20 superstars and we're done. We now need that mindset and that approach to be institutionalized. That in itself requires investment of time and capital and effort. So so the the capital use is divided in four or five basic pockets, and it's really driven by us being in there because for us, the capital deployment multiplied by maximum. So every dollar we give, we want a certain growth level. Remember, because we've mentioned investors, it's not just about putting money in and taking dividends. Right? We're constantly measuring कि हम capital जब दे रहे हैं तो वह grow कितना करें? And that does not happen frankly. Amazon, it's a big misconception in Pakistan कि it's a marketing problem. It's not a marketing problem. Marketing is a part of the problem. The major problem is really structuring the organization inwardly and its talent so that it is doing the problem solving with players who are in the Fortune 1,000 space, जहां पर उनकी opportunity and what they promise their boards is, in the millions of dollars, you know? And that's kinda how we distribute capital and and and apply our involvement with them.

Makes sense. My understanding would have been because you mentioned कि आपने PKR के ऊपर आप PKR के investment उठा रहे हैं. Do you think मतलब जो बहुत सारा एक पाकिस्तानी diaspora बैठा हुआ है जो कि tech space में बैठा हुआ है, right? And for them they would probably be more interested in investing in something like this considering they know the space. They can bring their own connectivity and so on and so forth. But, obviously, they're forex first. Right? So Yeah. Yeah. So how does that work out? Like, do you you you take that forex as well, but you're basically saying, listen, we're dealing in PKR so हमारी जो पूरी term sheets हैं वह PKR driven है. आप अगर dollar डालना चाहते हैं डालने कोई मसला नहीं है या आप कहते कि जी हमने dollar वाले को लेना ही नहीं हमने सिर्फ़ local पाकिस्तानी जो investor है उसी से हुई.

नहीं, हम dollar वाले को refuse नहीं करते हैं. Obviously, as a as a fundamental macro vision तो हमारा यह है कि we should be able to galvanize hundreds of millions of dollars within Pakistan into this space because वह local capital, Forex को fuel करेगा. Right? So at the macro, we're very interested. हम policy influence भी इसमें करते हैं. But we don't refuse dollarized investment as well because हमारे लिए वह dollar in and dollar out है, because our companies make money in dollars. So for them, it's the it's not a loss. Right? It's like, yeah, you're going bring dollar in. We're going to peg your hurdle rates and returns against that, and we're going to put money in things that are primarily making money in dollars. So it's, you know, something that they are they don't feel afraid of. Right? कि dollar डालने के कल exchange rate हो गया तो क्या होगा? वह हमारी companies सुबह सा बनाती हैं. So we structured in a way where we don't refuse that. It's not a focal area right now because अभी हम इतने young हैं in terms of the amount of capital being deployed in this space कि हमारे पास in the local ecosystem वह capital बहुत available है. Right? It's just about giving it the the safety and structure to come in this space. Now your next phase होगा where our companies are expanding aggressively internationally. They're already there, but there'll be a point where we need to pump a lot more capital where the diasporas network will start to come into play. I think we'll be more sort of pushing for that capital that type versus today. But we don't refuse it. We just structure it in a way where they for them it's, you know, dollar in, dollar out. Right? So it's it's not a big issue for the life. Makes sense. You you mentioned expanding internationally.

जब आपने, let's say, एक structure build कर लिया, उसके बाद जब आपने बाहर जाना है, चाहे आप, let's say conferences के ऊपर जा रहे हैं, चाहे आप sales offices बना रहे हैं बाहर, either or जिस तरीके से भी आप उसको manage कर रहे हैं. It's a lot of dollarized cost. इस वक़्त जो government का जो या जो economy का जो structure है जिसमें हर किस्म के hurdles हैं, right? So, local पैसा लगाकर local काम करना no problem at all. Dollar में कमा रहे हैं, सोने पर सोहागा. But when it comes to you know, ok so there's a company that's doing great. Now we have to invest in them because these guys would work really well in, let's say, Germany. Right? And so I wanna take, a million dollars worth of PKR, and I want to start up something in Germany so that the front exists over there, and they can begin to generate business. Problem वही आएगी कि capital movement किस तरह से होगी. And so how do you within the the space that you're operating in, how do you current see the current state of, you know, जो the the currency, current controls and so on and so forth. Is that something जिस वजह से आपको business पर impact पड़ता है या do you think there are enough workarounds for that कि ठीक है आपने कहीं ना कहीं legal तरीके से ही लेकिन आपने घुमा घुमू के वह manage कर लिया?

Look, I mean ultimately तो तो when we are scanning we need the the the policy makers to in the sun and and align with कि एक तो Fortune 500 space में जाना है. उसकी यह demand होती है and and then align and understand what policy we won't change. Right? So that's one of the reasons हमने local license for investing नहीं थी because we want to see it on the table. जी आप मारी बात सुनें. Here's a success. Make it happen. Now all our companies earn revenue outside. So they're already there. इनका offices भी हैं. Whether it's The Middle East, Germany, The US primarily, वह offices exist करते हैं. When I talked about expansion, we talked about aggressive expansion. Conferences being there and saying, yeah, we're going to compete with with with We're gonna compete with Infosys, TCS. Like, we are there. We're fundamentally we may be small in terms of individual company sizes, but we're going to add as much value. So we have to first, you know, be aligned with that. Now these companies our companies and and others outside our portfolio also have that capital available. Pakistan is progressing towards better policy to say, कि अगर आप dollar में, you 100,000,000 कमा रहे हैं, yes, you can go out and reinvest x amount percentage of that. We would like a complete freedom hook, but we understand that Pakistan's macro does want some of that revenue, dollar earned revenue to come back so it helps the macro economy. And that's okay to do as long as आपकी growth rate is now okay, nobody is a concern in that approach. But they have gotten some of those policies better in terms of leveraging some of that revenue earned in Forex to reinvest in their own strategic goals. And we keep talking to the right people and saying, you know, here's what we can do better, here's what we can do next. And they keep sharing with us them getting every concerns. So we come to a happy marriage in that in that solution.

Makes sense. अगर मैं again थोड़ा economics को ही थोड़ा macro के ऊपर जाऊं. Pakistan की जब हम problem statement को देखते हैं तो उसमें लोग हमेशा India के मिसाल देते हैं और again जब startups की बात हो रही थी तो मेरा उसके ऊपर critique एक किया था कि जी startup का model is great as long as people very openly say कि listen, we're businessman, we're doing business, we'll we'll we'll do a great job doing business. Right? When they started selling it as a as as this sort of solution for Pakistan, that's where I had a problem. Because the capital that you're bringing into Pakistan, that doesn't do anything. वह, like, सौ million dollar भी आ रहा है ना तो वह चुटकी बजाकर गायब हो गया और अब उसका उससे कोई continuous capital नहीं आ रहा. कोई investment ऐसी नहीं हो रही जो कि long term आपको productive, USD growth लेकर दे दी. In fact, वह सौ million जो लग भी रहा है या तो आप fail करेंगे और अगर आप successful होंगे तो वह 1,000,000,000 निकालकर लेकर जाएगा. So dollar में that's not really a solution for Pakistan. Similarly, अगर आप कहते हैं कि जी मैं, you know, economy के लिए बड़ा फ़ायदा है तो वह actually high quality बड़ी थोड़ी jobs produce कर रहा है और वह जो, you know, lower middle income के लिए, let's say, riders की बहुत सारी jobें produce कर लीं. But it's not creating a middle class with with with with wealth creation. So it's it's it's like कि हां ठीक है एक नया model है जिसके अंदर wealth now distribute differently हो जाएगी. But you're not with a with a with a country the size of Pakistan, the population the size of Pakistan आपको वह वह चीज़ solution नहीं दे रही. Again, nothing against them. But उसको तरीके से people need to understand कि वह क्या है और वह क्या solution दे रही and then maybe Pakistan के solutions जो हैं वह शायद different होंगे. चाहे वह industrialization में हों, चाहे वह, you know, और तरीकों से हों. इस context में जब आप services को, software exports को, इन सारी चीज़ों को देखते हैं and इसमें जब आपने ख़ासकर add किया कि यार AI की दुनिया आने वाली है और बड़ी दुनिया बदलने वाली है. तो then how do you see the आजकली, right? So, how do you see the macro for Pakistan considering the fact that we have a huge youth population and also simultaneously a huge, you know, amount of joblessness right now? Mhmm.

So so so in my view, the the macro solution, a permanent solution is if we have a permanent space in the B2B world creating high value, doing high value. There is no, there is like like we need to even stop measuring कि कितनी jobs create होंगी, कितना क्या होगा. We just need to focus कि हमने वह काम वही करना है. At scale, in the 14,000, 1,000 space जहां पर complex work होता है and and we need to go capture that. Now the only people who can capture that are organizations. Individuals can't do it. Relaxes cannot go to Walmart and say, जी हमें काम दिन. Right? It doesn't happen. Organizations have to be able to go capture that. So and our investment thesis is कि हमने उन organizations में invest करके उनको operationally restructure करना है, actively involve होना है, other position करना है, right? Which is the early stage where we're at. Once that model scales, I believe then that creates permanent wealth, right? Because उसमें जब एक company ने Fortune 1,000 में एक दबा काम कर लिया है और वह market trillions में है तो वह उसको multiply करते हैं, right? Then they're going to keep being in that space. वह RFP के लिए qualify करेंगे वहां पर players ही चांद होते हैं और उनका size grow करेगा. The question you're asking is that how do we grow big enough to consume all of the youth that we have, right, in that show? I mean, not necessarily. It's not really focused on you. Right? I want a wider perspective कि

economy.

How do we consume? Youth I meant. Like कि क्या let's say आपके पास 20 companies हैं जो tomorrow $50,000,000,000 का काम कर रही है in the Fortune, you know, 1,000 space. Does that consume the youth of of of and the talent that we have, right? So the answer to that question is very difficult. It's difficult because the age we're going into does not require that many hens to do that amount of work. And and the world is dealing with it. Like, Infosys TCS जैसी companies globally अपना पूरी structure करनी है because they have a large headcount. They have a 100,000 employees. Now, in order for them to go from x billion to y billion of growth, they will not grow, you know, in terms of headcount in the same way. So, हमारा problem about the real life, in the sense के, you know, we've got millions of of of graduates coming into the system, millions of people turning 18 every every year. Well, how do we consume that? So I don't know, I cannot measure कि exactly वह क्या होगा because age of AI ने disrupt कर दिए. पहले तो revenue and headcount were kind of going hand in hand from two thousand five to fifteen, right? Since 2017, that world has changed. Like, if you look at the layoffs that are happening in Microsoft and some the bigger companies in the world, those layoffs are not happening at expense of growth. They're growing while laying people off. Right? And and अगर आप fed और जो macro models create करते हैं, आप उनसे पूछें they're having to redo everything because the transition has been so rapid because of the age of AI कि आपको अब, you know, people placement has become a global problem. It will be if it's not already there. You know, especially the people who knew simple stuff like coding. So, to bring it all back to your question, right? Which is like कि हम यह चीज़ capture कर रही हैं, how does it impact and create wealth at different levels? We don't know कि वह wealth के scale पर create होगी but we do know that this is the only way we're going to create permanent wealth by doing technology work at scale and solving the most complex problem and let the chips fall where they may after पहले तो यह capture करें ना, पहले बीस, पचास, साक, billion dollars उधर से capture करें. Then we'll figure out what's left in terms of of of the the impact that needs to be made. We're not we're not लोएंगे फ़ुर पर है कि तो हम decimate हो जाएंगे.

Makes sense. Again, I want you to disconnect from your current role and I want to tickle your brain about the future. Right? Because the way that I see it over the next ten years, there are a lot of macros जो कि change होंगे. पहला again US जो कि historically बड़ी important consumer market रही है और consistently हर किसी का focus रहा है कि यार माल बनाओ US में बेचो, services करो US में बेचो. US अब अपने आप को थोड़ा सा isolate करने की तरफ़ लेकर जा रहा है और वहां पर जो है ना on some level, वह trade wars and this and that और वह अगर Trump साहब वापस आ जाते हैं तो वह यह कह रहे कि यार you know what like let's bring क्योंकि हम import करी जा रहे हैं. हमारा essentially अगर उनका dollar as a reserve currency ना होती तो उनका Pakistan वाला problem है. You know, there's huge amounts of imports, not enough exports essentially. And so if they're doing a backflip while in the age of AI and automation, जिसमें मैं personally जब देख रहा हूं तो मुझे सिर्फ़ AI नहीं नज़र आ रही है. मुझे AI and automation नज़र आ रही है. और ख़ासकर अगर I don't know consumers ने वह देखा है नहीं देखा लेकिन Xiaomi की एक factory की recently एक video आई थी and that was phenomenal. Because without a single touch of human hand they built It an entire was mind numbing. Right? And it gave you a glimpse of the future where the age of globalization essentially is now going to reverse where a lot of these developed world will begin to identify with, first of all, to build the the tools and the robots and the machines but will basically bring it all back to their own shores. And so मुझे वह एक hit होती हुई नज़र आ रही है जो कि हमारा एक historical model है ना कि यार माल बनाएंगे, industrialize करेंगे और America को भेज देंगे या Europe को भेज देंगे. उनकी उनको requirement थी शायद at some point ख़त्म हो जाए because जो उनका मसला था वह, human capital का था. वह human capital को निकालकर side pay करेंगे और automate कर देंगे. And so then the second thought that comes to your mind is कि अच्छा अगर वहां पर शायद उतनी growth ना हमें नज़र आ रही हो तो क्या हम services में घुस सकते हैं और हम अपने सारे लोगों को अंग्रेज़ी सिखाएं और कोई skill सिखाएं और हम कहें कि यार अब यहां से बैठकर काम कर लो. फिर AI hit करती है और आपको होता कि यार you know what like you don't the volume that you have and now you combine that volume plus India plus Bangladesh plus Philippines plus Indonesia तो वह इतनी बड़ी volume है कि वह दुनिया absorb भी नहीं कर सकती. I don't know, like, games के अंदर बैठकर आप जो है जी, एक दूसरे को छोटी छोटी economies नहीं set हो जाती कि मैं कुछ कर रहा हूं. वह productive नहीं है essentially, but money is moving that way. One way और the other, entertainment में, इसमें उसमें. How do you imagine the future in this AI and automated world that you speak about?

So I I do think that the risk is really high. I I think जितनी foresight हमें अभी है of all the logic based work, all the work that that can be done if you have the data, we feel that's shifting very fast. Now, as has happened in history, people transition to new work. But what happens is, in the past, हमेशा यह हुआ है कि जब भी shift आए ना, तो वह वह transition slower हुआ है. This time the shift is really rapid. You know, people are getting rid of white collar coders, for example, you know, digital models, right, like, at a pace which is unprecedented. So you're gonna have a thousand people unemployed tomorrow, and they need to figure out and reskill themselves. So the pace at which their work is being eliminated and reskilling is really, you know, disproportionate. Global problem, and nobody really knows the perfect answer to that, which is why you're hearing about universal basic income and whatnot. But the solution that we should have controlled and we should be controlling now is the B2B space within Pakistan. So, अगर आप मुझसे पूछते हैं ना कि why, what are one of the causes why technology companies have not got exposure is because local large enterprises in Pakistan have not been so focused on technology innovation to give the exposure to local tech companies. So if you look at our portfolio and look at systems and other companies, they're mostly focused outside. Why are they not getting cutting edge work from companies and enterprises that have scaled it? Why doesn't that ecosystem exist? I want a bite करेगा down the road because our local large brick and mortar enterprises have not been so digitally focused. Now we are seeing a bit of that transition happen, and that will make an impact on our local tech ecosystem. Because if you're doing cutting edge work at scale for local companies, because there is demand in them to do that, then your entire ecosystem gets better positioned for global work. But, Joab, risky बात करें earlier that with all of this shift happening globally, where do I see it? I do I see it as a major issue. Now developed markets who've got capital with the universal basic income affordable. They've got tax structures in place. They've got enough wealth to distribute further. And that will be a problem between the the two schools of thoughts, political schools of thoughts on that side. For countries that are developing and are emerging markets, wealth isn't available for redistribution. This is a major problem, you know, because automation, employment, What do you do? You can't distribute adequate living income to everybody, so you need to figure out what else to do. And that demand can buy So I don't have a perfect answer for this. I think this but but what we need to, as a macro, really focus on the policies work now so that in two, three, four years' time, if the global demand reduces, we are positioned for it. I don't think it'll reduce in the near term, Moussabel, honestly, because AI is like having a website. Right? AI incorporating AI and is used for the next seven, eight years. Everybody has to transition and The United States cannot domestically fulfill that demand. Middle East cannot domestically fulfill that demand. So, अभी के लिए तो I'm saying, पर अगर आप ने idea five years को waste कर दिया है by just focusing on gaining revenue and not positioning policy for post five years, we'll be in a very bad position because, you know, we're a population that keeps growing twenty, thirty guesstimates are, you know, what? 45 करोड़ or something like that? You know, somewhere in that I think 45 करोड़ जो है वह twenty fifty guesstimates हैं. Ok. So I'm happy to ask. Double हो जाएगा. But nonetheless, what what I also wanna understand is, देखिए एक एक perspective यह है कि यार cost

कम हो जाएगी. So effectively आपको जहां चार लोग चाहिए तब आपको एक बंदा चाहिए, right? So cost कम हो जाएगी and so people are looking at कि so what they're seeing is everything remains the same and we reduce the cost and so the margin call suddenly becomes higher for both services as well as the end user जो कि B2B का है जिसके पास अब suddenly headcount उसको hire नहीं करना to get the same level of productivity. Mhmm. एक इसका flip side भी है. Flip side यह कहती है कि यार अगर cost कम हो रही है तो जहां पर पहले चार companies कर रही थी अब शायद चार सौ companies करना शुरू हो जाएं. So हो सकता है कि in a lot of ways demand increase कर जाए because Mhmm. And and similarly अगर आप कहते हैं कि अगर मैं यह कहता हूं कि दुनिया जहां खड़ी है वहीं पर खड़ी रहे और इस जगह के ऊपर हम जो है ना बस वह talent को काम करते तो joblessness मुझे समझ आती है. But हम for example यह कहते कि उसी talent को redistribute करके जो दुनिया की productivity है हम उसको overall increase कर देंगे and overall prosperity effectively बेहतर हो जाएगी. In that context for example like again आपकी एक bet है ना हर किसी की एक bet होती है. आपकी bet है कि यार मैं Fortune 500 के साथ या Fortune 1,000 काम करूंगा और मैं high value extract करूंगा. But then potentially यह भी हो सकता है कि yes while your bet for you will work will work fine on a top down for for the government maybe macro के ऊपर the real macro number that is generated is through micro agencies and freelancers जो कि जाते हैं और जाकर जो है ना किसी company में घुसते हैं दो महीने के लिए काम करते A lot of people are also saying कि, you know, the age of jobs is over. It's basically, you know, you you you're a master of a lot of trades. You go in. आपने consulting में जाकर उनको दो महीने के लिए एक चीज़ deliver की high value premium के ऊपर और deliver करके आप निकले और आप अगले project पर निकल गए. Right? And so it's जो जो हुआ था ना कि freelancer या remote worker या यह शायद वह revolve कर जाए. तो do you think कि वह भी एक possibility potentially then हो सकती है कि yes, there is it works for you. But on a policy level, I'm not necessarily sure if just focusing on creating big giants may be the future. Maybe it's it's a lot of creating an ecosystem where in in a largely chaotic way, anyone can work for anyone and just making that conducive. Again, freelancers को government ने support किया in that context.

So medium enterprises in The US as a market are very excited. Right? Because big big enterprises उनके साथ medium enterprise rise करने के लिए, you know, the cost get there was very high. They couldn't invest in technology then all those problems. They're very excited. They're very excited because they're like, ok, हम तीस बंदों की team hire करके, you know, I'm a small company, I'm a small restaurant chain. I can compete with McDonald's. Right? I'm gonna give an experience to my, you know, 100 chain restaurant as best as McDonald's because now the amount of investment required for that is less. So we're very excited about that. कि जब हम Fortune 1,000 की बात करते हैं, we we talk about, you know, there are two sort of, like, medium enterprises as well. Like, for us, a journey, MRI companies are not ready to take a Gumsy Vojn 100, which is in the Right? It's a progression there. The medium enterprise market in The United States is a huge opportunity. Our vast medium enterprise is is, like, you know, bigger than most enterprises in Pakistan. Right? You you take a pop hog, you take some other company, they're huge, right, compared to what we have. So वह opportunity बहुत बड़ी है उसमें and and we encourage our companies to go into that space. And those companies themselves are very excited because at least in The US market उनका ecosystem इतना बना हुआ है कि they encourage competition. They want the medium player to have an equal chance to compete with the best because उनमें उनको outcome बहुत अच्छा ना कराता है. Either the medium player will become big, add value and and increase the size of the pie or the top player is gonna be challenged continuously to keep growing. So it's a win win for that macro economy. We intend on tapping into that. We intend on tapping into that demand. So to your question fundamentally यह क्या non Fortune 1,000 world इसमें participate करेगी जिसका trickle down effect क्या होगा? Yes, freelancers करेंगे काम होगा but I think जो जो मीठी काम है ना जो थोड़ा complex है because it goes back to a foundational principle At least as as investors हम कहते हैं, आप एक complex काम करना है. We want to our company should divorce from simple work, right? For for many, you know, for a host of reasons. लेकिन वह complex काम अब medium enterprise afford कर सके. क्योंकि वह करवाने के उनको hundreds of people ही जाए. They don't need a 500% they a 50% team, they need a 30% team. But is that type of work doable by one person? Maybe in the future, not today.

I think probably not even in the future. Think the difference that I see it is, sorry मैं आपकी बात cut रहा हूं. Difference that I see it is you're solving business problems, they're solving technical problems. So मैं freelancer भी नहीं ढूंढूंगा, ढूंढूंगा मैं remote worker को probably compare करूंगा कि if a medium enterprise wants to hire a direct remote worker for them they have a very specific technical problem जिसके लिए वह उस बंदे को hire करेंगे. लेकिन if they want a macro कि यार हम फ़ंसे में यह problem statement आ रही है. तो उस problem statement में generally they don't have the capacity or the capability to in house figure it out and that's when they will always offloaded and that will always be offloaded to a a third party proper structured company. Yes. That makes sense. I'm gonna wrap this up here at the one hour seven minute mark. Sure. I wanna ask you one last question. Actually, two last questions. पहला तो मुझे यह बताइएगा in terms of policy, you know, you've been in The US for maybe well over twenty years before you actually came back to Pakistan. Mhmm. And what year did you come back to Pakistan?

I was here in 2021 formally sort of structuring that. I visit in very often. But 2021 में I was fully sort of invested in in making this thing work. And now are you in and out or are you actively based in Pakistan? I'm actively based in Pakistan, but because of the nature of my work, I I do spend time in in The US going back and forth. And Pakistan में are you based on लाहौर?

Based on लाहौर. Right. Based on लाहौर. तो पहला तो सवाल मेरा यह है कि actually तीन अब सवाल होंगे. पहला सवाल यह है कि sir you came in 2021, right? So उसके बाद it's just been and so how was that? क्योंकि आपने एक Battley और उसके बाद the the world imploded. And so how has it been maneuvering through? अब तो I think I feel like कि अब तो वह the worst is over and you're now getting back on your feet. But how was that experience?

Very interesting. You know, लोग मुझसे बहुत पूछते हैं and, like, why did I come back? Right? I'll you, the I'm very blessed कि I'm in an emerging market जहां for this market with trailblazing. So, trailblazing is a lot of fun. You know, अगर America से आपने कुछ सीखा होता है, there's a confidence to trailblaze with optimism. Right? It's something because वह continuously वहां पर वह चीज़ हो रही होती People are constantly innovating and succeeding, innovating, succeeding and and it gives you confidence. So 2021 में आने के बाद and sort of seeing sort of the global shift, sure, I mean, challenges stay, but, you know, you sort of learn to relish that in a way. And we've been lucky que, you know, we've not been completely sort of decimated. We've had some luck and we made some good decisions. But to me, I don't really focus on the on the things I don't control. It's sort of what we can control and make good decisions and and move forward. So slash it was not terrible

from that perspective. Makes sense. अगर मैं आपसे यह पूछूं then कि in terms of policy, things that you can't control but you wish were different. Right? Mhmm. What would some of those things look like? कि if if if if we have to go towards exports, if we have to go towards globalization and we have to tap into the global technology market. You mentioned 5,000,000,000,000, 10,000,000,000,000. आपने AI mention किया. आपने let's say, data की side mention किया. I think personally जो चीज़ हमने बड़ी दफा miss की है conversation में वह वह वह है आपकी cyber security. Right? It's a Right right. I think there's going to be an incredible amount of demand for that आने वाले वक़्त के अंदर. अब उस चीज़ को government level पर तो हम देख ही नहीं रहे ना. हम तो सब देख रहे हैं Twitter ban पड़ा है. हम देख रहे हैं internet बंद हो जाता है. हम देख रहे हैं. Like, and there's just a huge disconnect between the current old industrialist and the way that business works in the modern time. And so if you were to identify some changes, what would they look like?

Well well, first of all, हमारी technology policy has to be at par with global standards. So so one of the things whenever I've talked to The US counselor here or I've talked to, people in the government, it's about saying that, we have our concerns. We have our interest in data security and whatnot, but we cannot simply go and say, here's our interest, you know, just comply with it. We're not that big a market that the world will change its technology. Right? The world has open free information going back and forth with certain expectations. इसके बाद global technology world engage करती है. तो हमें उसके साथ एक part चलना होता है while trying to safeguard whatever concerns that we have. So in terms of policy, first of all, I think all our policy has to be geared towards making our tech companies competitive in the Fortune 1,000 space. Like, in my, मैं after all the analysis we've done in this space, उसके like, that is the sort of foundational principle to which every policy should be geared towards. अब वह कैसे आप उनको position करते हैं, right? Tax policy should be very very friendly. It is friendly. Investor policy has to be very very friendly. Data security policy has to be compliant with global standards, Right? It can be more restrictive. Doesn't have to be more free, but they cannot be overly restrictive. We have to have great arbitration and and laws in place for business problems. Investors, not because they're concerned about the the the risk of security. They're not here because they're like, if I get stuck, where do I go for a for a solution? You know, do the courts exist? So from a policy perspective, there are hundreds things I can talk about. But ultimately, everything we have to make choices. And our choice should be कि हम ने best complex technology का work करना है जो global value add करेंगे. And whatever that takes, you know, it's some solutions today. साल के बाद the world changes, right? Your policy should shift but the goal has to be clear and and focused on irrespective of who's making decisions because अगर हम वह market capture नहीं कर सकते ना मज़ा मिल, we'll always keep eating, you know, scraps off the table. We'll always be eating crumps. We need to stop doing that.

You mentioned tax policy and particularly इज़्दफ़ा जब नए taxes लगे तो उस पर a lot of people made a lot of noise कि क्योंकि आपने double down किया on, employed salaried personnel और अभी भी जो conventional agri and retail and real estate को आपने उस तरीके से properly tap in नहीं किया. इसको मैं tie in करूंगा with the with with the churn of talent कि वह I mean for for them it just doesn't make any sense. कहते हैं कि यार या तो मैं remote work करके मैं अपना पैसा बाहर वह, you know, wise और इसके ऊपर पार करके बस limited amount ले आऊंगा Pakistan के अंदर. Mhmm mhmm. And so the entire structure of how it's all developed मुझे यह लगता है कि वह उसमें talent को रोकना और sustain करना बड़ा मुश्किल है और आप कह रहे हैं कि मैंने compete करना है तो मुझे उस compete में why is the government adding the cost ना? Tax की cost add हो रही है. अगर talent कहते हैं मुझे दस लाख रुकना है उस दस लाख रुपए के ऊपर अगर government तीन लाख रुपए tax लगा रही है तो that that means कि आपकी cost तेरह लाख रुपए. Right? That means उसको dollar में convert करके आप फिर बाहर वाले बंदे को उतना ही महंगा बेचेंगे. So, how do you like उस tax policy के अंदर आप अगर जो existing हैं चलिए तो सब मानते हैं कि यार उसको fix करना चाहिए. But उसके existing के अंदर what models could potentially exist? Because again क्या वह जो आप बाहर की company है वह बाहर वालों को बाहर से pay करें या वह बाहर park करें और park करके वह उनको एक cost की तनख्वाह दें? Like, is there an innovative model where you can keep the talent in place without having them leave for Middle East or US or Australia or whatever?

Mhmm. So I think problem को दोनों two ways पर concurrently solve करना पड़ेगा. So one is obviously very evident for the government and I think they're working towards that which is कि tax net को बढ़ high, tax base को बढ़ high because the burden of of, you know, income that the government has is is being footed by a few. Right? And and so they're trying to increase that. उसकी जो भी political concerns हैं, you know, you go to one group, वह complain करते हैं whatnot. That that that's something they're really aware of. But उसके साथ में हमारी tax के साथ relation हमारा बहुत adverse है as organizations, as as people. We don't see tax, we see tax as as something that is evil. Right? And the reason we see it as as evil is because we don't get anything in return. So, Juana Hichai, actually, que is while you're transitioning to a bigger tax base, concurrently, you need to incentivize taxpayers really well. So, एक बंदाय, who's who's working as a CEO of a company, is making good monies and the 35, 40% tax bracket, what is that person getting in return? Right? What is the person who's giving पचास हज़ार रुपए in tax getting in return? There's very little work being done in terms of incentivizing behavior, and and that relationship then becomes very adverse with tax. अगर आपने अगर आप चाहते ना कि the entire country focuses on the macro growth and every participates in the in the tax process, you've got to have very incentive based relation. वह relationship पर enough strategy नहीं है. Because देखिए, macro आप plasters, macro policy को ऐसी exist नहीं करती कि everybody one days incentivize कि हां मैं बहुत happy हूं 40%, right? 30%, whatever the number is. You need to be very granular and personalized, right? That should say, hey, Muzambil, you are at this place, here benefits for you. Essen, you're doing this, here benefits for you. You've got to incentivize that so that people are, at an individual level, you know, they are encouraged to participate. उस site पर कोई काम नहीं करता है. Most people say tax line बढ़ाओ, यह करो but, you know, they they they What sort of incentives do you think could potentially,

अगर मैं brainstorm करूं? I mean, मैं एक thought add करता हूं and then maybe you can take it from there, right? But मुझे personally यह लगता है कि there should be a a a blue passport for a certain benchmark से ऊपर taxpayer का. हर साल renew और आप क्योंकि अभी मैं पिछले दिन I was covering the Dubai का जो ban हुआ हुआ है आपका, right? And so I also understand and हम कहते ना हमारा passport rank नहीं करता. तो I understand कि हमारे circumstances में आप पच्चीस करोड़ के लिए यह argue नहीं कर सकते कि यार हमें pizza free access दो. क्योंकि आपके लोग छोड़कर भागते हैं, right? और उसकी वजह से governments जो हैं वह restrictions लगाती हैं. अब हर दवा जब मैं visa apply करता हूं या कोई भी company जो कि internationally जिसने conferences पर जाना है in fact वह even आपके comp जो जो professional sports वाले हैं. बहुत कम है. E games वाले हैं. यह हर थोड़े से वाला कुछ सुनने में आ रहा होता है यार वह world championship में जाना था, visa नहीं आया. वह इधर जाना था, visa नहीं आया. तो at least मैं यह कर सकता हूं. मैं कह सकता हूं कि यार एक certain benchmark से ऊपर अगर आप tax pay करते हैं तो Do you think इस तरह की कोई innovative interventions potentially आ सकती हैं जिसमें you can then begin to allow or incentivize कि again सलाहवाद airport में bureaucrats के लिए एक respect के लिए या उस club में enter होने के लिए वह जो है ना आपको tax दे दिया करेंगे. But do you think interventions like these could potentially help?

I I'd go a step further actually. I think that आप ऐसे incentives दें जो certain actions growth oriented domestic growth oriented actions को support. I will give you an example. So अभी अगर आप किसी को blue passport देते हैं तो आप उसको कह रहे hey अगर आप tax देते हैं तो you can travel with ease. That's what you're telling. Like here's a personal benefit for you. How would we do it look at it differently? We say, all right, if you were a high tax paying individual, if you tomorrow invest in the stock market and you take growth oriented actions and you exit out of that, we will deduct less from you on your gates. Right? You start layering in incentives in a way that people do things that help, that that drive them in a certain direction. अगर मैं आपको कहता हूं कि hey, if you're a tax paying individual and you also invest in the stock market and you exit out of that, the natural tax rate is, say, 20%, you will pay only 5%. Right? So so you sort of make it as a as a layered approach to keep adding value to the domestic market in that way. Simple stuff तो यह होता है convenience. Convenience is the most simple tax return and tax benefit you can get. You know, better roads, easy travel, blah blah. That's at an individual perspective. हमें creative ideas चाहिए that that that make people who are paying high taxes further participate in the economy and get a reward for creating upside? Like, there is a very there are creative solutions that require a lot of brainpower in that space, but we're not investing in that as much. When you start laying in creative ideas like that, that's how you get a multiplier effect of turning things around. I don't think a basic convenience is, like, level one of a benefit of being I think you need to sort of have very growth oriented actions being rewarded and and opportunities given to taxpayer, especially when multiplied effect, you know,

Makes sense. And that brings me to the last question. I want to understand you know you came back from The US and you started and decided to invest in Pakistan. At least one thing I like is that आपने बड़ा again growth focus तरीके से आपने उसका वह structure बनाया है. So it makes a lot of sense कि जो evolution है उसके अंदर ही the growth and the success is tied in hopefully इंशालाह. But I wanna understand how do you see Pakistan of 2050? कोई vision होगा ना जिसके ऊपर आप आए तो आपने सोचा होगा कि यार यह चीज़ irrespective of the current noise sooner or later is going to evolve in a certain direction. What's that direction? What's the image of Pakistan in 2050, twenty six years from now?

I actually don't want to do it much early, and I'll tell you something funny. What you guys seen here? Because he just had a a a picture and said that by 2075 or something, Pakistan will reach its status of, like, number six in GDP and number six in all that. Right? Because we're the sixth or fifth or sixth largest in terms of population in the world. And Hallaway's limit. Right? Is that the aim that we have that in, like, you know, fifty years we'll get somewhere in the top? I think the target has to be by 2075. I think in the next ten years, we should be in the top 10 in terms of GDP and growth in the world. We're the fifth sport, fifth technologist country in the world, and we have a lot of opportunity to go capture. हमारे पास large youth that is talented, that's in Anglori. You know, we just need to fix a few things. And by 2035, our goal should be that we are in the top 10 countries in the world in terms of GDP, in terms of value addition, and and and doing it in a way that we'll sustain that. I don't think in twenty, fifty, पच्चीस, these are, like, mean, people have turned things around in five, ten years when you focus. And I think our approach has to be on an apertured basis because my population grew career, you know, we can't wait for thirty years to for things to get better. We need to have a very aggressive path of a ten year plan and say, yeah, we're going to be in that space because people have done it. Right? When you create value globally, you innovate and pursue certain things, it's possible. I'm not a big fan of, like, but just these salvas, I'm going be too over for that. I want to see that when I'm still young enough to enjoy progress. And, I mean, look at, you know, neighbor countries. Mean, at ten year plans when things turn around. It's it's very much possible to do XTL.

Makes sense, Essen. Thank you so much for taking the time out and joining. Thanks so much. And for all of you guys, thank you so much for watching. अगर आप overseas पाकिस्तानीs हैं तो we're actually trying to brainstorm कि how can we potentially solve the talent problem for Pakistan? नीचे एक link दी हुई है जिसके ऊपर हम एक initial community बना रहे हैं. You can join that and be a part of our founding member. हम उसके अंदर आपसे एक data form solicit करेंगे. So we're actually gonna be very exclusive with the people that join that community, but it's going to be focused on building the talent that will eventually be a participant of someone like, let's say, ऐसान or other people working in the services industry in the dollarized space. But, anyways, I would love to hear your thoughts of, the startup ecosystem in Pakistan, Pakistan's economy. Let me know in the comment section below. But this was सय्यद मज़मिलासन जैदी. Thank you so much and I'll see you in the next one.