Thought Behind Things · May 15, 2023
The startup building loyalty tech for restaurants
Yahya Humayun, co-founder and CEO of Pattern App, walks through his journey from EY to Airlift to Dastgyr — and why he left a rocket-ship B2B startup to build loyalty and discovery technology for brick-and-mortar restaurants in Pakistan.
with Yahya Humayun
10 min read
From Multan to management consulting: the long road before Pattern
The episode opens with Muzamil explaining why he agreed to feature a consumption-driven startup at all — something he had publicly avoided given Pakistan’s economic conditions. His reasoning was simple: food is the one industry that survives any macro environment. “Dunya tabah ho jaye, log khana khate rehte hain,” he says. That framing sets the tone for a conversation that is less about hype and more about whether a specific model can hold up under pressure.
Yahya Humayun was born in Multan in 1994, moved to Lahore in grade five when his father expanded a website development business, and completed his A-levels before heading to UCL’s international program in Lahore for a bachelor’s in business management, graduating in 2016. The post-graduation period was, by his own account, disorienting. “Graduation se expectation yeh thi ke acha so jab university se graduate hote phir sab samajh aa jaati hai,” he says. That expectation collided with reality fast. He tried selling mobile accessories, gave interviews in Dubai, and came back to Pakistan without a clear direction.
His first real job was at EY, in a division focused on performance and process improvement advisory for government and private clients — Lahore Transport Company, NTDC, and WABDA among them. The work was intellectually interesting but exposed a structural problem he would encounter repeatedly: the gap between proposing a solution and actually seeing it implemented inside a large, change-resistant institution. “Impact kab karna hai, right?” he recalls thinking. After a year and two months, he moved to Bank Alfalah, drawn by a role focused on consumer experience design as the bank tried to modernise. The pattern repeated — interesting problem, slow execution, prolonged feedback loops. He stayed ten months.
Centimeter, Metro, and learning what brick-and-mortar actually needs
The next stop was Centimeter, a sister company of Arbisoft, working with Germany’s Metro on a customer experience measurement product for their Pakistan stores. The setup was more agile — private clients, faster iteration. The core product captured phone numbers at the point of sale as unique identifiers, then sent tailored surveys based on what a customer had purchased. Item-level data flowed back to manufacturers; store-level scores went to Metro’s headquarters. It was Yahya’s first real exposure to the data problems of physical retail — problems that would later become the foundation of Pattern.
He was genuinely happy there. Then multiple people in his network told him about Airlift, a mass transit startup that was growing fast and building something that had never existed in Pakistan before: a bus you could book from a mobile app, that would actually be on time, for sixty to eighty rupees.
Airlift, COVID, and the 100,000-rides-per-day target
Yahya joined Airlift after a rapid-fire hiring process — a LinkedIn post, a cold email, a case study submitted within five hours, an interview the next day. The goal when he joined was 100,000 rides per day, a number he describes as “insane.” His role was operational: ensuring that across drivers, buses, apps, and logistics, nothing broke as the company scaled.
Muzamil pushes on why Airlift’s transport operation ultimately failed. Yahya’s view is that COVID was a genuine disruption, not just a convenient excuse. “Woh bahut achi trajectory par the,” he says. The utilisation playbook had been figured out, the data was pointing in the right direction, and international investors were backing subsequent rounds. COVID broke the momentum before the model could prove itself at scale.
The conversation then turns to Swvl, Airlift’s regional competitor. Muzamil argues that the B2C mass transit model was fundamentally complicated — booking a seat on a bus that was going to move anyway made little intuitive sense — and that a B2B model targeting companies with large workforces might have been more durable. Yahya acknowledges the logic but explains the venture-backed rationale: to attract financing at scale, you needed consumer numbers first, and then you could layer in B2B verticals once you had the brand and the data. “Agar main aaj ek nayi company hoon aur main Nestle ke paas jaoon aur jaake boloon ke you know I am gonna do this — like, who are you?” The B2C scale was the credential. The model was working in other markets. The variable nobody had priced in was a global pandemic.
Dastgyr: zero to one, then knowing when to leave
When Airlift’s transport operations shut down during COVID, Yahya found himself at a crossroads. He had already invested his savings into Dastgyr, the B2B e-commerce marketplace being founded by former Airlift colleagues Zohaib and Owais. He spent three months at Byte, a cloud kitchen startup that got into Y Combinator — the first consumer internet startup from Pakistan to do so — before the Dastgyr team convinced him the timing was right to join full time.
He joined in September 2020 when the team was around eight or nine people. By the time he left in February 2022, it had grown past 250. The experience was, in his words, “an experience of a lifetime.” But the zero-to-one stage was over. “Woh zero to one wali jo stage thi woh chali gayi thi,” he says. The culture at Dastgyr actively encouraged people to think about the next problem they wanted to solve. And in February 2022, something clicked.
The brownie experiment that became Pattern
Post-COVID, restaurant owners were struggling with a specific problem: they had built delivery habits during lockdowns, but as dine-in returned, they had no tools to understand or retain their on-premise customers. They had no data on who their customers were, when they came, or why they stopped returning.
Yahya and his co-founder — who had also been at Dastgyr — started talking to restaurant owners. One told them about fresh brownies that weren’t selling. The team made a few calls to people nearby, brought them in, and the brownies moved. “We realized ke on-premise user ko store ke andar aane ke liye they need a motivation. The restaurant is willing to do that. The consumer is also looking for exciting opportunities like that — but koi bridge nahi hai.” When they asked the restaurant owner what he would pay for that bridge, he offered four thousand rupees a month at fifty rupees per transaction. The business case was immediate.
Pattern launched in Lahore with 100 restaurant partners. The model is straightforward: restaurants list their storefront on the app, consumers follow them and enroll in a membership program, and the restaurant controls what rewards, cashbacks, and promotions flow to which customers. The platform is asset-light — costs do not scale with the number of orders or users. “Jab do restaurants hamare platform ko use karte hain tab bhi wahi cost thi aur jab 100 karein tab bhi wahi hai.”
Discovery, Yelp, and the missing map of Pakistan’s food scene
Later in the discussion, Muzamil walks through the app live on screen and raises what he sees as the bigger opportunity: not just loyalty, but discovery. He describes being in Lahore recently with no idea where to eat, and argues that Pakistan has never had a Yelp equivalent — a trusted, review-driven map of the city’s food scene, including the legendary hole-in-the-wall places in old Lahore’s galis that have never been captured anywhere digitally.
“Food blogging jo hai woh chalti hai because it’s all about discovery,” Muzamil says. “Discovery humne aaj tak us par rakhi hui hai ke you know got like pretty pictures and people will fall for that. It has to be a bit more human.”
Yahya agrees and walks through the consumer-side vision: discovery of restaurants, social signals from your network about what people are eating, ratings, pre-ordering, table booking, and exclusive rewards — all in one place. He gives a concrete example: a coffee shop partner whose pistachio latte had sold zero units in ten days. Pattern featured it in a “popular around you” section targeted at users likely to enjoy it. Within three days, 100 drinks had sold. It became the shop’s top seller.
The review product is being rolled out carefully — currently visible only to restaurant owners, not consumers, because early restaurant partners were worried about competitor-driven review bombing. Verified reviews will only be possible after a confirmed transaction on the platform.
POS integration, the Pakistan-specific psychology of cost, and what comes next
Muzamil raises the question of POS integration — if Pattern can eventually see 100% of a restaurant’s transactions, not just the 30% flowing through the app, the data becomes dramatically more powerful. Yahya is candid about the sequencing challenge. Building a full POS is a different product entirely, and the willingness to pay for pure POS infrastructure in Pakistan is low. “Ek acha quality ka product ke liye jisme sirf receipt nikalti hai, aap ek certain amount mujhe mahine ki dein — there is willingness itni kam hai.” The psychological barrier is that a POS feels like a cost, while a tool that brings in new customers and increases revenue feels like an investment. Pattern entered through the revenue side deliberately.
The likely path is partnerships with established POS players rather than building from scratch. Yahya confirms those conversations are already underway.
On delivery, he is equally clear: Pattern will not build its own logistics. The focus is on-premise, brick-and-mortar, in-store. Delivery partnerships with existing players are possible and already happening in a limited way — some restaurant partners accept delivery orders through the app using their own fleets.
Short-term paranoid, long-term optimistic: surviving the startup winter
By the end of the conversation, Muzamil puts the macro question directly. Pakistan’s consumption economy is contracting. Startups built on consumer spending are in a difficult position. How does Pattern survive the next three years?
Yahya’s answer is structured around a principle he calls “short-term paranoid and long-term optimistic.” In the short term: stay focused on the single most important problem, iterate without ego, and make sure the business model makes sense today — not in some projected future. Pattern’s model is already profitable at the unit level. No money is burned on orders. The restaurants fund the rewards. “Jab do restaurants hamare platform ko use karte hain tab bhi wahi cost thi.”
In the long term, he is genuinely optimistic — and specific about why. The 2020–2022 boom, despite its failures, produced a generation of operators who now understand what doesn’t work. “Woh jo hai na, woh in hindsight aaj se das bees saal baad nazar aayega ke that was the most important part for the genesis of the successful startup ecosystem.” His prediction: the founders who survive 2022 to 2025 will be the ones who build Pakistan’s next wave of durable companies, in the same way that Careem’s alumni seeded hundreds of subsequent startups.
Muzamil adds his own framing — one he says he has stated on record multiple times — that the real wealth creation for Pakistan will come through exports and services, and that consumption-driven startups will only thrive once that external money is flowing in. The boom of 2025–2027, when it comes, will vindicate the founders who stayed the course through the difficult years. “Cyclical hoti hain cheezein. Down aata hai, up aata hai.”
Pattern is currently live in Lahore with 100 restaurant partners and expanding to two more cities. A seed round announcement is expected before the end of 2023.
Full transcript
शामिला कपिलों नज़रात welcome back to another episode of thought behind things. आज हमारे साथ मौजूद हैं एक बहुत ही खास मेहमान जिनको बुलाने का मकसद यह था कि but ऐसे ऐसे हमने किसी startup को नहीं बुलाया considering कि आजकल के economic हालात के अंदर मैं on record भी हूं. दो तीन दबा मैंने यह बात बोली कि startups का जो है वह हालात बुरे हो सकते हैं considering कि generally वह consumption के around चलते हैं. But तो generally वैसे मैं personally avoid कराता but this is one startup जो कि still जिस industry में हैं, जिस model में वह हैं that is an evergreen model दुनिया तबाह हो जाए लोग खाना खाते रहते हैं. And so I thought you know इनसे एक तो conversation की जाए but SSM बात करना चाह रहे थे they based out of लोहौर जब से इनकी pre seed announce हुई थी. But finally you know he was coming to तो हमारा tie up हो गया आज हमारे साथ मौजूद है याया हुमाइयों who is the co founder and CEO of the pattern app sir thank you so much for being part of the show. Sir thank you thank you so much for having me. मैं conversation start करूंगा. थोड़ा सा मुझे बताइएगा where were you born and early life आपने कहां पर गुज़ारी?
बिल्कुल सही. So so I was born in मुल्तान, 1994. उसके बाद I grade five तक schooling मुल्तान में की और उसके बाद में किस school में थी? City Central School. Right. Is that like a city school का? No. What is it like? Is it different? Ok. Yeah. So, central school था grade five. उसके बाद my father had to move to लोहौर for expanding his business which is essentially about website development and maintenance. तो फिर लोहौर move किए, grade six में और grade six onwards पर लोहौर. कौन से school? So, grade six to seven there was a school called ICAS. Grade seven to A levels, there was another school called SAISA. वह I think spin off था same school का ही. Right. So went there. A levels किया SAISA से twenty thirteen. Right. And then went to UCL. International program है University of London का. Went to लोहर for university और three year program था. And did my bachelor's in business management.
Right. और 16 में graduate किया था? 16 में graduate किया. अच्छा मुझे यह बताएं कि how was मुल्तान growing up? This was early nineties, right? Mid nineties. Yeah. So what sort of memories do you have of मुल्तान?
So मुल्तान is great. मुल्तान I think that was a very early age and he used to live a joint family. तो मुल्तान was, मुल्तान is home. अच्छा originally family आपकी मुल्तान से भी. Family मुल्तान से. You go there often? Yeah. Eats वगैरह पर? Yes, अभी recently I was हीत पर वहीं था. और कैसा evolve किया overall as a city मुल्तान
since your childhood?
So मुल्तान essentially उस उतनी speed से evolve नहीं किया जित्ने बाकी शहर की हैं but it's still catching up. Right. Do you think potentially
do you think कि you could see it as a big metropolis? मैं इतना बताता हूं ना यह so I I had these maps in the studio and this one map of the subcontinent हिंदुस्तान जो है eighteen eighteen का map है and यह मुझे बड़ा interesting लगा था. यह मैंने इस वजह से रखा था because इसके अंदर एक तो कराची नहीं है. So eighteen eighteen में कराची wasn't like And so I was like यार दो सौ साल पहले मुल्तान was this extremely important central city जो कि over time after the border came in, कराची became important because of the port and मुल्तान didn't grow. So maybe it was because कोई logical trade route नहीं था उसके through या क्या वजह थी? But do you think at this point in time अब तो खैर वह South Punjab का भी एक कोई शोर मच रहा है. Yeah. Do you think कि एक एक importance and potential जो historic importance है वह return होगी,
I think मुल्तान has a lot of potential but वही आपकी university वाली बात is very very important that I think एक चीज़ उसको supercharge कर सकती है, catalyze कर सकती है वह I think the the establishment of university, university is actually I think वह एक चीज़ है जिसकी वजह से काफी ज़्यादा हुआ है but generally मुल्तान is growing growing pretty fast. Very cool. So
you graduate in 2016 from UCL and immediately after graduating आपने क्या? Did you उस time पर think कि यार you would be doing a startup या? नहीं. You know बस job ढूंढनी है और कुछ भी होगा. Exactly बस job ढूंढनी है.
कुछ पता नहीं था. My biggest fear was that so graduation से expectation यह थी कि अच्छा सो जब university से graduate होते फिर सब समझ आ जाती है. Right. तो वह एक shock था कि यार अभी तो नहीं सब समझ आई. हां. तो फिर अब सब समझ दें. So tried यह भी नहीं पता होता ना कि समझना है क्या? So बहुत सारी problem solve करनी है. Right.
वह एक I think था. और अब कोई बताने वाला भी नहीं है. पहले तो बस यह था कि यार अब यह degree कर लो और यह कर लो अब चुप करके इसमें आंखे मंदे भी घुस गए. Exactly.
तो नहीं लग ही रहा था कि अच्छा business की हर चीज़ समझ आ जाएगी ना. So but फिर वह practical छोटे मोटे practical उस वक्त किए like mobile accessories का छोटा सा business कर लिया, mobile covers का business कर लिया, figure out किया but वह बहुत mainstream situation but realize कि अच्छा यार big picture में करना कह रहे हैं. तो उसके बाद searched for jobs actually went to Dubai. मेरी फुप्पो होती है वहां पर. Interesting experience था obviously, gave a lot of interviews. Interview के अंदर सबसे बड़ी जो चीज़ realize होती थी कि यार अच्छा सो क्योंकि generally आप बड़े आराम से convince कर सकते हो किसी को. So things that I have knowledge about I used to think that I am good at convincing people on that. But then I realized यार I don't have much value to create for this company that I am talking to. मतलब मतलब what what difference can I really create, right? Right. तो पहले लिया है कि नहीं यार this thing I need to work on a lot of things. Came back to Pakistan. Got a couple of job offers but वह कुछ समझ नहीं आई थी कि where will they lead me to AWP? भी नहीं बताया कि करना क्या? So came back to Pakistan. Interestingly my first job then was EY which is essentially about audit and tax in Pakistan. But Middle East की जो उनकी division थी they were doubling down on the advisory service line. Right. तो so advisory around management consulting? Yeah. तो university में शौक तो बहुत हो कि case studies पढ़ी होती है और हर किसी ने management consultant बनना होता ना यार यह तो बड़ी दफ्त. तब तो food chain ना McKinsey में घुसेंगे. Exactly exactly. तो और अच्छा लगता है यह मसला understand करना है और फिर उसको solve करना है. तो interesting Got an internship there leading to a full time role. Right. That was my first job. And that was in Pakistan? In Pakistan yes. गौर. Long did you do that for? So I stayed there for a year
and two months I think. And you had converted to a full time role what by that were you doing in that role? So performance improvement और process improvement advisory
service line थी. Suddenly they were like government clients and private clients. Right. सीखने को बहुत मिला, बहुत interesting लगा. There was lahore transport company was one of our clients, NTDC, WABDA was one of our clients. So होता essentially यह था कि इसका structure यह होता था कि government and private Honda was a private client. होता यह था कि clients कहते थे यार यह हमारा मसला है और यह इतनी बड़ी scale पर हम लोग यह कर रहे हैं कि we don't know कि क्या करना है. तो आप check करें अपनी क्योंकि वह global company है तो आप check कर सकते हैं Middle East में उसके counterparts यह वाली problem कैसे solve कर रहे हैं and then essentially उसको थोड़ा localize करके recommend कर सकते हैं. I was too, was at a junior level of course, was learning.
So that gave me a lot of good exposure. How are the, the, the partners or the senior folks there? A lot of times इसने management consultancies का मैंने यह देखा है कि जो वहां पर लोग होते हैं ना they are the real असासा. McKinsey में जितना मेरे जितने ही friends थे वह you know they always talked about कि यार McKenzie और McKenzie का experience शायद इतना interesting नहीं था, इतना था partner के साथ काम करने का कि वह तेमु झगड़ा के साथ काम किया यार you know सारा मैंने उससे सीखा है. So in that aspect how were the people there? So people were great, people were really good over there.
It was more about के so एक जो अगर challenge की बात करें तो challenge यह है के so you have gotten अब एक तो it's a new thing happening in Pakistan. Right. Then people want you to solve the problem but the person or the point of contact who wants you to solve the problem is like a large public entity जिसके अंदर change वैसे ही इतना resist होता है. Right. तो आप तो अपनी तरफ से बहुत बड़ा solution propose करोगे but उसको execute और implement कौन करवाने वे वह lines कहां पर draw होती हैं? हां हां. So I think वह I realize के अच्छा सही है यह research और यह तो बड़ा सा वज़द्द है. But impact कब करना है right? तो तो वह I think that was one thing. It And was good
so one year two months later what was the next switch? Yeah so one of my colleagues
from EY went to bank अल्फला और वो consumer banking division headquarters जो थे, उधर थे and then they had a role कि अच्छा ok so the world is moving towards digital banking and बिल्कुल this is twenty eight, twenty nineteen, twenty eighteen actually. So 2018 में like the world is moving towards digital banking और हमारे conventional processes और policies हैं तो we want to create अच्छा उनकी McKinsey ने restructuring की थी और McKinsey उसको चार पांच role उन लोगों को recommend करके गए थे कि these are some of the people, some of the roles that you need to fill in if you want to, you know, step into the future. Right. One of that, one of those roles was of an in house consultant sort of a role which would look at consumer experience design and actually make those changes. So I found it very very interesting. Had a couple of conversations with some senior folks over there during the interviews and I was really excited. उसी point in time I had recently gotten married तो it was a good thing कि अच्छा fancy situation होगी, fancy job and all तो बयंकल्पा very well reputed. तो Of I was like let's let's join that. Right. तो फिर I joined, joined in. उधर भी learned a lot क्योंकि इतना disabled थोड़ा of information that you are exposed to and there is so much to solve and you are like अच्छा यह काफी ज़बरदस्त चीज़ें होनी होती हैं. But then again even in banks I think क्योंकि यह impact की जो वह है time towards impact वह थोड़ा relative है. आपकी expectation पर depend करता तो आपकी मेरी expectation में you know you do something and you get impact immediately. वहां पर एक learning थी कि नहीं यार it's there's a lot of red tape, there's a lot of bureaucracy that you have to. I think हमारी generation है ना and we're maybe two teas सबसे
बड़ा जो lesson learned किया वह lesson learned वह lesson ही of patience है क्योंकि हमें एक तरह से ना वह articles ने और social media ने उन्होंने कहा था कि यार जाओ और जाकर बस फ़ट जाओ. फिर हमें समझ आया कि nobody really wants to change, right? So you have to like bang your head on the wall so many times to just create a very very small dent and then I think four five years later आपका ना थोड़ा ठहरा हुआ आ जाता है. Yeah. हां, slow and steady वाला. That's very true. So so consumer banking, did you, did you think कि you're gonna do that for a long time?
I didn't think so. अच्छा. मैं वह उस pursuit से गया था कि explore exploration मेरा phase होता अच्छा देखूं मसले इस space में क्या होते हैं और solve कैसे करने हैं और तो तो बहुत ज़्यादा मुझे like I didn't feel like there was because you know वह आपको वह होता है ना क्या कहते हैं consistent होता है process के you know there is impact, you get super charged again then you create more impact then you get energized again and you know. Right. So that cycle has to happen. Right. If that cycle is prolonged then you start thinking कि यार you know maybe I should Move on. Move on. And so how long were you there at Alpha? Like ten months. अच्छा. And what was the next job? Then basically I went to centimeter which is a sister company for Arbisoft. Right. Interesting था वह काफी. It is linked तो वहां पर काफी अच्छी learnings हुई. So वह क्या कर रहे थे? Arbisoft technology software services company. उनके अंदर एक customer experience solutions management company थी जिनके भी clients थे. But this was more agile. Because this these were private clients and this was a private company and what was happening? Dealing with clients abroad or or in Pakistan? So metro was one of the biggest clients so German Germany metro के साथ वो थी agreement right. चाहिए ये था और वो वहाँ से समझ आई कि अच्छा brick and mortar businesses के क्या problems है. तो they were like के you know we need to be super competitive, we need to scale but we have no visibility on हमारा in store customer experience होता कैसे? Right. So उसके अंदर क्या parameters है, measure कैसे करना है उसको because वो सब offline. So उसके अंदर they basically requested to, to काफी सारी चीज़ें हम उन्हीं के हिसाब से evolve कर रहे थे कि एक survey tool है जो कि जितना भी data capture होता है depending upon कि consumer ने किस section में मतलब for example fresh produce लिया है या FMCG products लिए हैं और कैसा experience है? वापस आऐंगे कि नहीं आऐंगे? अगर नहीं आऐंगे तो क्यों नहीं आऐंगे? Store से कितना तालुक है? उन चीज़ों से कितना तालुक है? How were you gathering this data? Were there like some sort of sensors, surveys? POS में आ रहा था तो वो सिर्फ phone number request कर लेते थे. ठीक है.
For because they had membership program वगैरह. So phone number से if they would as an identifier use होता था? Yeah. And then how would you define case? बस वह so the data points that you had were the phone number as a unique identifier and
sort of जो चीज़ें ख़रीदी हैं वह और उसके ऊपर analysis analysis हो रहा था. हां, तो उसके ऊपर फिर उनको चला जाता था depending upon कि किसने क्या लिए उसको उस हिसाब से tailored एक survey चला जाता था. अच्छा survey चला जाता था. Ok ok ok interesting. जिसका response rate को maximize करना was one part. Right. And then उस survey के जवाब जवाब जो आते थे उससे understand करना कि अच्छा what needs to improve. Right. और वह फिर essentially उसमें कुछ होता था item level. जो for example अगर किसी ने Pepsi का नया flavor लिया है तो उसको कैसा लगेगा और वह अब क्यों नहीं आऐंगे वापस? तो वह आप back channel कर सकते हैं to the manufacturer. Right. और जो store level information है उसको आप back मतलब channel कर सकते हैं towards the headquarters और उनके हर different मुल्क में किस तरह का scores आ रहे हैं. और यह यह global
अब तो खैर वह क्या हो गया है? Change हो गया ना metro से?
वह Pakistan के लिए रहा था क्योंकि उनका जो दूसरा service provider था वह Pakistan में operate नहीं करता था. That's called medalia.
Right, so they have a global global level पर यह चीज़ हो रही है but वह उन्होंने Pakistan के लिए उसका separate book किया, makes sense? Yeah. How long were you there for and how was this particular experience? क्योंकि यह मुझे थोड़ा सा ज़्यादा लग रहा कि थोड़ा सा ज़्यादा है जायल है तो. यह interesting था. Interesting यह बहुत interesting था I was really happy here.
Doing good. एक speed पर एक अच्छी speed पर operate करता था जो कि obviously because मेरा exposure भी obviously मैं अपने साथ साथ देख रहा हूं कि अच्छा कितना speed बढ़ रही है. तो यहां पर I was doing well. What happened was that two or three very reliable people who I reach out to for advice actually told me कि lift mass transit
उस वक्त is was starting out. अगर आपने passive income के बारे में परेशान है खासकर आजकल की economy में जहां पर already cash continuously burn हो रहा है और inflation हमें मार रही है. तो I am proud to announce that this video is in partnership with समाया Financials. They are offering two very very cool trainings. Capital market fundamentals जिसमें आप stocks और mutual funds में invest करना सीखेंगे और understand करेंगे कि आखिर एक company के अंदर क्या ऐसे fundamentals होते हैं जिनको आपने देखा होता है to figure out कि वह एक अच्छी company है to invest in और दूसरी training है technical analysis master class जिसमें आप सीखेंगे कि किस तरीके से हम different tradable assets like commodities, forex, stocks, crypto के अंदर थोड़े से पैसे लगाकर बहुत ज़्यादा पैसे बना सकते हैं. Personally यह training मैंने भी ली है and it's absolutely phenomenal. The link to the trainings are in the description below. Check them out and become financially healthy and now back to the podcast.
They they had actually started out. They were doing, they were growing super fast. मुझे तीन चार लोगों ने कहा कि यार you should definitely speak with this team because this is a team that इस तरह की team we haven't seen in Pakistan before and the kind of impact that these people are trying to create is is amazing. You you should talk to them. तो I was between that point कि नहीं मतलब I am really happy so you know I I used to think you know the only time you think about switching role is when you are unhappy. Right. Or you know trying to if you are not getting what you, you know, aspire for. तो हुआ यह कि then I heard a lot about them. फिर एक दो मैंने चीज़ें देखी. LinkedIn post एक बार यह हुआ कि I saw LinkedIn post that Air Left was hiring and the role was I think called create your own role and they had just described the problem कि mass transit की Pakistan में इतनी problem है. Ride hailing is expensive, people can't go to work and it's such a huge part of the economy and बड़ा उसमें ज़रूरत है so we are trying to solve this problem. तो जब मैंने problems चाहिए, तो बड़ी interesting है. से बात करते हैं या पूछते कि if I can help in you know, anywhere right, it is good to talk to good people. So by the time I copied the email address that post was deleted. Right. So then I reached out. फिर मैंने email कर दिया. मैंने लिख दिया कि यार यह बहुत interesting चीज़ है. दो चार मेरे पास ideas आ रहे थे कि you know this is how I think you know we can we can do stuff. I got a call like I think two hours. अच्छा. तो I was like अच्छा यह speed की बात तो interesting सुनी है. I think यह so I got a call, I got a case study actually कि अच्छा यार तो great that you reached out. यह case study है this is an interesting problem that we have been think about. We would love to understand कि आप कैसे solve करते हैं उसको? यह भी बड़ी अच्छी चीज़ है. I spent some time case study करके I sent it. मैंने भी कोई पांच घंटे में भेज दी. So then I got interview invitation for the next day. खैर interview process के अंदर I met the team and I was like blown away. Ok, मतलब यह यह level of speed और यह level of impact तो is amazing. So had a had a had a few more conversations with with the team and I decided कि, you I want to, I really want to be a part of this team. The role essentially was pretty dynamic. Point यह था कि they had a clear goal of doing a 100,000 rides in the next four months which was insane. So
100,000 rides पहुंचने. 100,000 rides per day. Per day, per day. Wow, अच्छा. So,
उसके अंदर यह था कि interesting बहुत था कि अब अब when I started looking at it कि ok so you creating something that has never been created before. That now people would, you know, book a seat from a mobile app and they would know where the bus is and then they would be there and the bus would actually be on time. So, is the rot in the background that needs to happen for that magic to happen. Right. And then they would like travel in like what sixty to eighty rupees and the business would still make money and they use, you know, consumers will be able to actually accept jobs because I had also heard from my close network के कुछ ऐसे लोग थे जिन्होंने job accept कर ली थी सिर्फ इस वजह से कि lift exist करती थी क्योंकि otherwise for example बहरिया town से अगर किसी ने defense जाने. हाँ हाँ. लोहार की बात करो तो I think वो distances तो उसमें they could accept it only because एक viable सस्ता mode of transport था हाँ. और decent acceptable, right? तो मैंने कहा कि यह करने के लिए तो अगर यह हो गया तो यह तो बहुत ज़बरदस्त हो सकता है और उसके अंदर my role was a century two. So इस तरह था कि कम लोग थे और सबके पास different काम थे to do और ताकि एक बंदा एक चीज़ का directly responsible individual वन जाए और फिर बस अब उसके नीचे जो भी होगा वह आप नहीं देखना है. Right. तो उसमें यह था कि So very democratized and repowered. Yeah. तो बस ensure करना है कि कुछ भी like किसी भी वजह से वह bus हो, वह driver हो, वह app हो, वह driver की app हो, वह कुछ भी हो out of the million things that can go right or go wrong, making sure that we can scale and nothing breaks in between. Right and how long were you there for? So I was there until COVID hit और फिर COVID में it had to close down the mass transit operation क्योंकि
दुनिया बंद हो गई थी. Right. So I was there till then. And the airlift had at the time had only launched in लोहर or were there in multiple cities? No, were in कराची and लोहर. Right. Why do you think airlift का जो transport operation है वह failed?
So वह तो COVID आ गया. अगर COVID ना आता do you think it still would have survived? I think वह बहुत अच्छी trajectory पर थे. क्योंकि main जो अगर मैं उसमें ऐसा थोड़ा deep dive करूं तो I think जो आपने code crack करना था वह utilization का था और वह काफी ज़्यादा क्योंकि data आने के बाद यह समझ आ गई थी कि किस तरह उसकी playbook वन गई थी. Right. तो फिर वह COVID का यह पता उस वक्त like in hindsight तो मतलब उस वक्त तो किसी को नहीं पता था कि अब यह एक महीना चलेगा या छह महीने चलेगा या क्या होगा, right? Right. तो वह being a startup of course you have to.
No no, of course. Airlift के बड़े similar पर swivel चल रहा था. Yeah. Right? And swivel, did sustain after COVID, but they eventually had to shut down as well. So again if I were to ask you industry का rather than the actual वह industry में अगर देखें तो where do you think they they went wrong? Like what was the missing link and all of it? I think
so they stayed longer in Pakistan because उनके पीछे एक तो they started early और वह Egypt में और दो चीन और बुल्कों में काफी successful चल रहे थे. तो उसके अंदर यह होता है कि एक तो you know the size of your organization you you may be take a little bit more risk कि यार अच्छा दिखते हैं कि where, where this goes. But then where it was going was कि अब समझ नहीं आई थी कि you know एक और strain आ गया फिर से lockdown हो गया तो we can't you know it's time to sort of focus on the markets जो कि खुल रही हैं और हम वहां पर you know double down कर सकें. Fuel prices भी fluctuate कर रही थी उसके अंदर, consumer
spending patterns भी फ़र्क हो रहे थे. Do you think अगर जो यह वाला transport आपने बात अच्छा बोला, you identified and I remember I did a campaign for swivel.
अच्छा.
And while doing the campaign I realized कि जो सबसे बड़ी utility है ना इसकी वह दो हैं, jobs and universities और वह utility rather than trying to create a bus massive mass transit system where, you know, anyone can hop in from anywhere and then and it's it's complicated. It was complicated. I don't know. I never tried Airlift but swivel का it was complicated कि यार मैं app खोलूंगा, फिर उसमें मैं bus को book करूंगा, फिर वह bus, I I don't know why the booking was required because the bus had to move anyways. फिर मैं जाऊंगा और मैं चालीस रुपए में मैं DHJ पहुंच जाऊंगा. It made no sense. The the economics made no sense at all. वही चीज़ अगर मैं alternatively देखूं तो, you know, मेरे office में there were kids who would come from the other end of स्नाहाबाद and the average cost of करीम for them was you know $5,600 rupees per trip, right? So बारह सौ रुपए a day is for twenty days अगर मैं weekends निकाल भी लूं is तो अगर वह सारे मिलकर भी बारह सौ दे दे तो suddenly the price point was not 60 rupees it was 300 rupees but it made a lot more sense. So do you think कि अगर वह model rather than क्या आप consumer b to c hit करते तो आप B2B hit करते जिसमें आप companies को जाकर allow करते कि यार you know I understand your guy you have a lot of folks and your folks are maybe even coming in cars in a lot of ways. And even those cars cause them fuel, right? So what if we create buses for you and we solve this problem this this you know bringing them together problem because आपका चाहे वह पूरे शहर से हो हम buses लगा देंगे और फिर हम ऐसे ही सब buses को fill करेंगे with other people. तो that may have worked a bit more considering कि वह एक ऐसा consumer था जिसने day day start day end में दो buses लेनी ही लेनी है. आप उसको जो भी कर लें. बिल्कुल.
नहीं I think that that's a great point और on that मैं like I'll share the perspective that generally you know the venture backed startups in the industry had and उसकी logic. I think it's a different go to market strategy और यह जो अभी उन लोगों ने approach ली थी उसके अंदर जो rationale था, वह rationale यह था कि because transport is such a huge industry. So to do this you have to get some financing and for the people who are going to finance you want big scale. Numbers, And big numbers for and then उसकी वजह यह है कि अच्छा so अगर मैं आज एक नई company हूं और मैं Nestle के पास जाऊं for example या किसी MNC के पास जाऊं और जाकर बोलूं कि you know I am gonna do this. Like who are you? और अगर मैं वह हूं जो B2C पर सब वैसे ही मेरी बातें कर रही हैं तो फिर later मेरे पास you know और इसका breakdown इस तरह यह ना कि अच्छा अब आपने economics को sense बनाना ना. तो फिर आप देखेंगे कि सुबह सात से नौ बजे वाला persona और है वह शायद school जाने वाला customer है. Right. नौ से दस हर persona को right place at the right time पर अगर आप fit कर दें तो you become so big. Yeah. That then you can launch all those verticals के. Yeah. Ok, now we will do a pooling, now we will do B2B, now you know तो. Yeah. I think वह go to market strategy यह थी कि you go big और I think it has worked other in other places in the world but वह किसी ने यह factor नहीं किया हुआ था कि यह break लगेगी COVID की वजह से क्यों वरना तो break नहीं लग रही है. I don't know यार. COVID is a is a great excuse
to pivot that they used. I think the margin call wasn't there in Pakistan. You go to Egypt or you go to the Middle East and Middle East can get the I mean, the same distance in Pakistan costs 10 to 12 times on a करीम. Yeah. You know, you give half that price and suddenly the bus is much more valuable and now that the bus is more valuable तो आप margin call है ना एक customer जा रहा है मतलब अस्सी साठ रुपए.
वह तो मैं तो you know वह है you are right लेकिन if you look at the trends ना यह तो हम snapshot देख रहे कि साठ रुपए. हां हां. But you see कि वह user तीस पर आया, चालीस पर उसने दस rights लेना शुरू की, साठ पर उसने बीस कर दी, सौ कर दिया, डेढ़ सौ भी किया, उसकी stickiness बढ़ती जा रही है, उसकी rides बढ़ती जा रही है. Right. So the data is telling you कि यार हां because you had they had to be an entry point. Right. But now you're मतलब वह उसको wow experience मिल गया है और अब वह that is a good investment into that customer which is not gonna go away. उसका the reason why I support this वह narrative is because it was working, right? Because there was money flowing in from super smart international investors and there were subsequent round happening. I while while I do agree कि COVID मतलब उसके अंदर बहुत ज़्यादा और चीज़ें आ जाती हैं कि ठीक है, it's a good excuse to pivot. But generally things were looking up, right? Right. तो वह I think. Right.
So, के time पे then you decided कि अच्छा आपने नई जगह पर जाना है, what was that?
So, yeah. So, COVID के अंदर actually so a lot of us teammates were left without roles क्योंकि company पूरी समझ नहीं आई थी कि क्या होएगा? So a lot of people did not have roles anymore. उसके अंदर one good one of the many good things about A Lift was that they they used to be like बहुत ज़्यादा brainstorm करते थे on नए ideas के क्या next बड़ी problem है Pakistan के अंदर solve करने के लिए और उसके अंदर एक काफी common जो हमारे discussion point जिस पर हम काफी detail में discuss करते थे वह यह था कि जो किरियाना stores हैं और जो retail stores हैं, grocery stores यह बहुत बड़ी market है. बहुत ज़्यादा underserved हैं और बहुत ज़्यादा potential है backbone है यह economy की. तो इनके लिए भी बहुत सारे मसाले हैं जो कि COVID में maximize हो गए थे क्योंकि दुनिया बंद थी और वह कुछ खरीदने नहीं जा सकते थे और missile काफ़ी ज़्यादा आ रहे थे. तो two of दो colleagues हमारे airlift से who were in the founding team at airlift, ज़ोहेब and ओएस. They were starting out दस्तगीर. तो ज़ोहेब से काफी मेरी इस पर discussion होती थी and उन्होंने कहा कि आप सब यह करते हैं. I was very excited about the problem as well but हुआ यह कि I had accepted a job offer at BiTE. So, मैं काफी personally confused था क्योंकि वह था एक cloud kitchen startup और I was मतलब काफी interest था कि अच्छा यह यह यह cloud kitchen वाली चीज़ के अंदर और anything related with food. खासकर COVID
के time पर तो cloud kitchens were suddenly very very important.
Exactly और वह भी बहुत ज़बरदस्त concept था कि ok so आप एक ही kitchen space के अंदर छह different brands कैसे operate कर सकते हैं ताकि brands के लिए भी sense बने और consumers को भी एक अच्छी price point पर खाना मिल जाएगी क्योंकि खाना तो लोगों ने खाना ही नहीं है. Are they still operating? Are they still operating? कहां पर कर रहे हैं आप? लोहौर में. अच्छा interesting. काफी ज़्यादा लोहौर में expand कर रहे हैं वह. So so वह है. तो मैंने वहां पर job offer accept कर ली थी और तो तो the heart was in two places. तो किया मैंने ये कि I, I had some savings और फिर the best thing I decided to do was कि I put in all my savings into दस्तगीर just to somehow be associated with it. Three months I stayed with Byte. Byte also got into Y Combinator which is very very popular and one of the best accelerators, venture capital accelerators in the world. It was the first consumer internet startup to get selected in Y Combinator. तो मैं I was there at that time. I was a part of तीन लोग थे उस वक्त हम team में and the founder. तो काफी interesting था वह setup किया, different models experiment किए. तीन महीने में वहां पर था. इस दौरान बहुत back and forth होती रही but towards the end of the third month, you know, I also decided and, you know, the team at the सिगिर convinced me कि यार now is the right time to join क्योंकि traction मतलब बड़ी जबरदस्त business की trajectory नज़र आ रही है and I think अब यह सही time है to scale this up into something big. Right. तो फिर I joined September 2020.
Right. And how long were you in दस्तगीरफ़ल?
So I was there till from September 2020 से लेकर February 2022 तक. तो तकलीफ़ली. अच्छा, you were there for a while? Yeah.
And how was that? पूरा उस वक्त तो I believe उसको build करना, उसको बढ़ाना by
that time तो काफ़ी फ़ैल चुका हुआ था दस्तगीर I suppose. बिल्कुल बिल्कुल तो हम I think उस वक्त कोई आठ से नौ लोग थे और जब when I left तो फिर हम कुछ ढाई सौ ज़्यादा लोग हो गए थे. अच्छा. कमल्लाह तो. Wow. That was, that was an experience of lifetime.
तो वह Why do you decide to leave? Because अस्तिलगीर is a solid start up like the अगर मैं उसको देखूं तो they have the fundamentals laid out. They know what they're doing and it's just a matter of it's a time game, right? Like, keep on doing that and you have a very very solid sort of मगरमच्छ जो कि eventually आपस में टकराएगा, बहुत सारे स्तरागत है यार, the bazaars of the world and so on but you know you you've seen the space, you understand कि this is gonna work. It's fairly risky gamble to
be able to leave that. So यह काफी interesting है. I think this was one of the most difficult decision and also like one of the most important decisions in my life. तो उसमें यह था I think the background about it is कि जब हमने start किया था तो कुछ भी नहीं था, right? तो and then it, it, it went on to become one of the most successful startups in the, in the country, in fact in the region. तो zero to one वाली जो stage थी वह चली गई थी. उसके अंदर बहुत land किया. In fact my, my current co founder at Pattern, I, was the only person other than the founders on the team when I joined. अच्छा. तो together मतलब फिर you know you wear multiple hats हर चीज़ करनी है right, demand, supply, what not. तो उससे समझ ही आई कि एक तो यह है कि talent को opportunity बहुत मिली. Jobs बहुत create हुई country में जो जिन लोगों के लिए हम build कर रहे थे, retailers, sellers, वह बहुत ज़बरदस्त उनका business thrive किया और एक वह जो आपको consistent fulfillment और reenergize आप हो रहे होते हो along the journey, वह मतलब at at max throttle हो रही थी. And in February 2022 we were doing doing fairly good, fairly comfortable. We also relate to but the the the culture at dustigir and the emphasis on creating the next wave of entrepreneurship and not only thinking about yourself and actually giving back to the ecosystem का इतना strong वह culture था कि we all used to think, you know, neck और obviously nobody thinks about leaving but you think about the next thing you want to do in the same umbrella, right? तो हुआ यह कि February 2022 we were, काफी problems तो हम obviously इस तरह discuss करते थे but February 2022 एक something clicked and you know click यह हुआ कि हमने देखा कि यार यह उस वक्त भी COVID खत्म हुआ था और restaurant owners जो थे वह काफी ज़्यादा परेशान थे और परेशान इस तरह थे कि भाई, सारी orders हमारे delivery पर आते थे पहले क्योंकि पहले तो लोग आते ही नहीं थे. अब लोग आ रहे हैं लेकिन skewness ऐसी हो गई है कि काफी लोग हैं जो अब वापस doors खोल रहे हैं और वह इतनी ज़्यादा physical brick and mortar जो restaurants हैं, वह चाह रहे हैं कि हम अपने customers को अच्छी service दें, हम उससे अच्छे पैसे कमा सकें, हम एक अच्छा business बनाएं. It's a very emotional thing as well कि लोग restaurant खोलते हैं बड़े शौक से कि अच्छा यहाँ पर यह मेरी खासियत है, इसके बारे में लोगों को पता चले, लोगों को पता लगे कि यहाँ पर किस वक्त क्या चीज़ अच्छी मिल रही है, वह आई but क्योंकि competitive landscape ऐसा change हो चुका आज technology इतनी ज़रूरी है so started deep diving to that problem and यहां पर अभी we were still at दस्तगीर and we stopped talked to काफी सारे restaurant owners and realized कि उनसे पुछा यार आप क्या करते हैं कि जब आपने लोगों को nothing उसमें से कुछ भी sustainable नहीं हो रहा था क्योंकि उनके पास ना कोई data था. उनको नहीं पता मेरे customers कौन हैं. उनको नहीं पता वह कब आते हैं, क्यों आते हैं? उनको वापस बुलाने के लिए क्या करना है? So they were like यार so so this particular you know restaurant scenario that we were discussing was they said कि यार हमारे पास brownies हैं जो कि fresh हैं but यह अगर कोई नहीं लेगा तो they won't be fresh. तो हम free brownies देंगे with anything that they buy. अच्छा सही है. So we made a few calls, हमें पता था आस पास कौन लोग हैं और हमने उनको बुलाया, उन्होंने कुछ purchase किया और उन्होंने brownie free ली. So we realized कि अच्छा on premise user को store के अंदर आने के लिए they need a motivation. The restaurant is willing to do that. The consumer is also looking for exciting opportunities like that but कोई beach में bridge नहीं है. तो उस bridge के अंदर अगर आप technology का element ले आएं तो millions of users can actually benefit from this consumer side of things and millions of restaurants can also benefit from it. जिसके अंदर there can be a win win scenario and उसके अंदर फिर because we were evaluating a business तो हमने उनसे पुछा कि sir हमें क्या देंगे? तो फिर like यार आप इस पर मेरे से उन्होंने एक amount बताई क्या चार हज़ार रुपए पर आप मेरे से पचास रुपए ले लें. So we were like सही Makes business sense. तो that is when it clicked and of course we फिर हमने और business models दुनिया में देखे कि अच्छा दुनिया में brick and mortar stores और restaurants क्या करते हैं इस चीज़ को scale करने के लिए और कैसे इसको बेहतर बनाया जा सकता है तो काफी models देखे फिर हमने देखा कि Pakistan की specific requirement क्या है और फिर उस हिसाब से we decided to build pattern out and that is when we the the the decided
to sort of. Twenty twenty two February. Yes. And right now in May 2023, around a year and a quarter. How मतलब क्या किस point में आई? Do do know कि आपका around I think four five months पहले pre seed announce हुआ है. जी जी. Half $1,000,000 का. जी जी. Are you guys, have you shipped to market? Is it live? What's going on there? Yeah, so so बिल्कुल it's live in one city लाहौर.
I think उसके बाद तीन चार महीने we did you know research, research and development फिर we decided to figure out कि अच्छा minimum viable अब ship करना क्या है, बनाना क्या है, test कैसे करना है? So उसके बाद I think then we went live in लोहौर. We're now expanding into two more cities very very soon.
And how many restaurants are on board in लोहौर? So 100. 100? 100 yes. अच्छा अगर मैं आपसे पूछूं कि एक restaurant है let's say कामरान साहब की कढ़ाई. अच्छा. ठीक है? अच्छा उसमें pattern so so run me through कि क्या like what all is there with that particular restaurant on average? What's the experience? What is it and what what's in it for the consumer and what's in it for the restaurant?
Absolutely. नहीं, great question. So होता ही है sir के restaurant owner want so so our team meets with the restaurant owners and then they realize कि अच्छा आपकी खासियत क्या है? आप चाहते क्या हैं? दुनिया को क्या बताना चाहते हैं अपने खाने के बारे में? आप क्या चाहते हैं कि लोग आएं और वो क्या try करें? कौन से लोग क्या चीज़ try करें? आप और the essential idea is कि restaurant जो run करें वो अच्छा खाना बनाएं. और उनके business को grow कैसे करना है? उनके consumers का experience कैसे बेहतर करना है? वह उनकी tension ना हो. वह technology करें और consumers को भी यही हो कि हम जहां जा रहे हैं, हम बस select करें और जाएं और हमें बेहतरीन experience मिले, बेहतरीन quality मिले, बेहतरीन price मिले और अच्छा experience मिले. जैसे हमें सिर्फ तो तो वह जो deprivation होती है एक अच्छे experience की वह होती है कि हर किसी ने अगर मैं comparables draw करूं तो दुनिया के जो giants हैं restaurant space में, सिर्फ Starbucks है या mcdonald's है. तो उनके पास तो इतने muscle है, इतनी team भी है कि वो एक काफी high tech अपनी कोई mobile app बना सकें जो कि sometimes becomes more popular than the restaurant itself क्योंकि उसके अंदर आप reward points जमा कर सकते हैं, आप cashback जमा कर सकते हैं, आप जिस तरह की चीज़ खा रहे होते हैं आपको उस तरह की चीज़ें recommendations आ रही होती हैं और आपका you know आपका wallet होता उस app के अंदर और आपको बेहतरीन experience में होता है. But mom and bok restaurants या coffee shops जो होती हैं उनके पास यह technology available नहीं होती. तो essentially अगर मैं इसको walkthrough करूं तो restaurant अपना storefront list करते हैं. जैसे वह अगर मैं comparable draw करूं तो Instagram पर अपना page बनाते हैं. फ़र्क सिर्फ यह है कि हम उनको कहते आप अपने followers अगर यहाँ पर build करेंगे तो consumer जाकर उसको follow कर सकते हैं. जो follow कर रहे हैं वो उस membership program में enroll हो जाते हैं और फिर जितना वो spend करते हैं या जो भी criteria restaurant ने set किया होता है उस हिसाब से उनको free items मिलते रहते हैं, rewards मिलते रहते हैं, cashbacks मिलते रहते हैं, sometimes उनको promotions आती रहती हैं depending upon जो भी restaurant चाहते हैं. तो restaurant essentially अपने thousands of users से एक portal के through connect जाते हैं और वो वहीं पर customize कर सकते हैं
customers के लिए. मुझे यह बताएं कि अगर एक restaurant है again जी. कामरान साहब की गढ़ाई बोला था ना हमने. जी जी. तो कामरान साहब की गढ़ाई के अंदर transactions हो रही हैं सुबह से लेकर आता है एक हज़ार. मेरी assumption यह है कि अभी at this point in time आपकी तीस या चले तीन सौ transactions जो हैं वह pattern आपके through हो रही हैं. ऐसे ही है. Do you have any visibility on the 700 transactions that are happening otherwise?
So not as of yet. Okay. But the the catch here is कि हम क्योंकि कामरान साहब की कड़ाई जो है उनको यह पता लग गया है तीन सौ orders के साथ कि जो तीन सौ orders pattern app पर आते हैं ना उसके user का review भी उनके पास आता है. जो पिछले वैसे बड़ा regularly आते थे अब नहीं आ रहे. तो you can also deep dive and understand कि वह क्यों नहीं आ रहे? होता ही है कि उस restaurant के अंदर, कामरान साहब की कड़ाई के restaurant के अंदर
transactions जो कि best case scenario sure वह shrink होती जाएंगी but normal real case scenario के अंदर there will be new people coming in and out. So they'll always be a set of recurring customers and there will always be a set of new customers जो कि in and out like लाहौर में for example कोई घूमनेपन्न आया भाई वह irrespective of whether they are members or not. Memberships should be a should be an upsell, but irrespective of whether they're a member or not, every restaurant so it should be the biggest map of restaurants, in Pakistan. The second thing that I find very interesting is कि आपने एक चीज़ दरिबाने बोली कि ideally best case scenario there should be a data ecosystem where discount should not be given driven by, के you know segmentation वगैरह यह वो but the real value will be कि मुझे एक notification आए दोपहर चार बजे कि अगर आप पांच बजे से पहले पहले इस restaurant चले जाएं ना तो आपको यह यह discount मिल जाएगा और वो driven by create revenue there? जितना भी होगा मैं 50% भी कह रहा हूं as long as my waiter and my chef and my boss are busy working तो मुझे revenue से फ़ायदा है. And उससे फ़ायदा essentially यह होगा कि और उसको करने के लिए I need to know not just कि मेरे pattern वाले कितने लोग हैं. I need to know कि exactly total कितने हैं उसमें there are multiple ways to solve the problem. One would potentially be कि यार मैं camera की feet उठाऊं उसकी और मैं उसकी feet उठाकर जो है ना मैं बैठकर एक basic वह डालना शुरू कर दूं. मैं daily की feed आ रही है मैं महीने का एक वह run करूं. You know image processing और मैं identify कर लूंगा कि footfall किस तरह से perform कर रहा है. Costly है, थोड़ा complicated है, tech talent चाहिए आपको. दूसरा तरीका यह है कि मैं उनको दस्तगीर की तरह जो है g p o s पर ले आऊं और मैं कहूं कि यार बहुत अच्छी बात है आपका pattern app है but p o s भी आप मेरा इस्तेमाल करें. हर table को so जो big restaurants हैं आपके और मेरे लिए एक real value I feel like कि are not upgrading themselves to the same level of POS and tech tax जो कि conventional restaurants कर रहे हैं. So what do you think about that? When you begin to take over the ecosystem and then through that are able to create a lot more value? Absolutely absolutely. I mean, you're you're spot on. I think it's very very important.
But, so I'll tell you about the limitations and Right. And and and the time basically, time element of it. So the challenge is कि एक point in time पर it's very very important to solve one problem very very well. The other problem is कि so so there are POS की companies दुनिया में जो सिर्फ POS बनाती हैं और वह एक different ball game है. बिल्कुल. It is a matter of when, IceTa IceTa अगर मैं बताऊं तो हमारा जो restaurant side technology है, वह वह वाला जो product है वह I sell it is a POS of some sorts. बस फ़र्क यह है कि उस पर 100% of the transactions से shift होने हैं. उसके लिए it takes time to build that. It is, costly to build that and then you also have to evaluate if there's willingness to pay for it. वह जो है ना, that is the next,
problem to solve. Next frontier. Understand that I think there are multiple avenues to solve that problem. उसमें partnerships भी हो सकती हैं effectively. Right? You can actually plug in a POS partner and say, k, listen. You have handled the POS. Let's participate in a data sharing program. Not complete data sharing of customers, but, like, a cleaned up sort of process data sharing program through which we can then run and I'd begin to identify कि यार हम इसको हम अपने value कितना further optimize कर सकते हैं. Absolutely मैं इसमें एक चीज़ elaborate करता हूँ. तो
एक है कि यह void बहुत बड़ा है कि Pakistan में POS का उस level पर जिस जिनसे इस तरह की integration हो सके. There is an absence of players like that. Why is that? Is because and this is also very we were very intentional about entering the restaurant landscape with this particular model क्योंकि अगर मैं आपको थोड़ा सा simplify करके वह बताऊं ना कि यह psychological है थोड़ा Pakistan के अंदर, POS या किसी भी चीज़ जिससे मेरी direct मुनाफे में इज़ाफा नहीं हो रहा ना मेरे लिए एक cost है और एक ऐसा tool जिससे मुझे नए customer आ रहे हैं और मुझे पुराने customer ज़्यादा आ रहे हैं, मेरा मुनाफा बढ़ रहा है, उस पर acceptance significantly higher है. अभी तक अगर आप किसी को जाए कहें कि एक अच्छी quality का product के लिए जिसमें सिर्फ receipt निकलती है, आप एक certain amount मुझे महीने की दें तो there is willingness इतनी कम है क्योंकि वही इस तरह मैंने बताया challenge लूब. Loose करो मैं पैसा हां. कि भाई अभी तो मेरे पास मुनाफा तो बड़ा है पहले. हां हां. तो हमारी approach यही है कि मुनाफा बढ़ रहा है और जिनका बढ़ जाता है which is why we were actually intention about scaling the restaurant का number कम क्योंकि 100 is not a big big number क्योंकि पहले ही ज़रूरी है कि जिनके साथ काम करें बजाय इसके के वह 1,000 का number दें. बेहतर है कि जिनके साथ काम करे उनके actual फ़ायदा है. उसको ice था ice था अब उसको बिल्कुल. आपने
एक problem उठाई हो फिर उसको आप completely take over कर लें ताकि वह सौ restaurants completely
pattern ecosystem पर आ जाए and then you can then move on to that. और वह आपने बिल्कुल सही कहा कि हम we are already in talks with people जो कि internationally बहुत अच्छा करें in the POS space and we want कि जिनकी expertise है हम उनके साथ integrate करें ताकि बेहतरी create हो सके. So we are definitely in talks with that with with those partnerships. I think the likely next steps would definitely be to partner क्योंकि वह एक अलग ball game है. Makes sense and what about
consumer side, right? So as a consumer what's my incentive of एक तो चलो मैं दुकान में गया या मैं restaurant में गया और उसने कहा कि यार यह app है इसको download कर लें और यह हमारी जी rewards app है. So you know every time I go to let's say McDonald's or whatever they ask me sir आपके पास app है? मैं कहता नहीं sir मेरे पास app नहीं है. तो कहता sir app download करना मैं कहता यार you know it's like taking the phone out unlocking it and then downloading it through my data right now. So उसकी वह somehow वह incentivization हमेशा नहीं होती. होती है? I'm not saying नहीं होती. नहीं नहीं बिल्कुल. But is एक other जो मुझे बहुत ज़्यादा नज़र आ रही है वह use case मैं अपने personal से draw करता हूं. Recently I was in लोहौर and for the life of me I was like यार मुझे restaurant पर जाना है किसी अपने cousin के साथ जाना था and I had no idea. Like how do I find a good restaurant in लोहौर? How do I find a good coffee shop? But that shouldn't have been the way that I would like ideally the way that it should have been would be कि मैं कोई app पर जाता और उस app पर जाता और मैं जाकर देखता कि यार what do people love the most? And as long as I have that opportunity to be able to वह तो मैं मेरा footfall directly drive. Like, it's very easy कि once you become the ecosystem where if you wanna understand food, come to our ecosystem and we'll tell you with the reviews, with the वह सारा का सारा. And the footfall with no costs to anyone, the footfall begins to increase their respective. And then the upsell becomes incredibly easy, right, because you already have that. Now you you just add add it on. So getting the next thousand restaurants become easy when the restaurant is already hearing कि यार हमने pattern app पर देखा था और आपके पास हम आए हैं. Exactly. तो फिर वह pattern app जब आती है और आई कहती है कि अच्छा भैया अब हम आपको ना यह service offer कर रहे हैं बजे आप पचास रुपए और हर thousand दें और आप जो है ना deals भी करते they they then convert much faster. Absolutely. So so where do you see yourself in that aspect? Absolutely
आपने बिल्कुल you know you you explained it very very well. Exactly यही है हमारी consumer side के ऊपर. So consumer side को मैं आपको walk through करता हूं. Consumer side का एक जो premise है वह simple है कि अगर आप खाना खाने के लिए बाहर जा रहे हैं, essentially अगर आप बाहर जा रहे हैं तो आप खाना तो खाएंगे. तो आप वह discovery से लेकर, discovery of the restaurant, वहाँ जाकर खाना क्या है? आपके जानने वाले जो आपके social network में हैं, वो क्या खा रहे हैं? किस चीज़ की rating ज़्यादा चल रही है? आज आपके करीब सबसे बेहतर dish, सबसे बेहतर drink कौन सी चल रही है वो it's easy to navigate. आप वो पता कर सकते हैं. फिर आप वहां जा सकते हैं, वहां जा के आप book भी कर सकते हैं जाने से पहले. अगर आप line में नहीं लगना चाहते तो आप order करके pay भी कर सकते हैं. अगर आप वहां बैठ के करना चाहते हैं तो वहां पर आप उनके exclusive rewards भी end कर सकते हैं. So all of this is included in the consumer वाली side. इसकी मैं आपको एक example देता हूँ. So जिसमें consumer और restaurant दोनों side आऐंगे कि एक coffee shop engine साथ हम partner करते हैं. उन्होंने बताया कि यार मेरे paper का जो menu है ना तो pistachio latte कोई try नहीं करता और इसका material भी हमारे पास पड़ा हुआ है जो कि मैं चाहता हूँ कि लोग try करें लेकिन कोई भी नहीं करता. So we said कि यार this is exactly why we are here. तो हम this was the first experiment that we ran. हमने उनसे पुछा कि आपकी यह कितनी बिकी हैं पिछले दस दिनों में. So they were like यार एक भी नहीं बिकी and we were like ok. So फिर हमने क्या किया वह जो आपने इस तरह बताया ना कि वह उस वक़्त हमने we included that in the popular popular around you section. अब ऐसे होते कि automatically चीज़ें update होती हैं but हमने उसको include किया कि यार this is what we recommend for the day and जिन लोगों को मतलब obviously हमारे पास data कहते हुए थे तो पता होता है कि किस you know what are those people who would actually like having this? तो उनको वह चीज़ नज़र आने लग जाती है. उसके बाद within the next three days I think we sold 100 drinks. वो उस particular pistachio latte because people then got to know एक तो उनको नज़र आई. उनको नज़र आया कि मेरे कौन से जानने वाले क्या ले रहे हैं? So discovery for the consumer is also beneficial और उनके लिए भी वो beneficial है अब उनकी top seller वन गई है. तो यह एक use case है जो कि users को भी एक नई चीज़ मिल गई और restaurant को भी यही चाहिए था कि यार यह दुनिया को लोगों को पता लगे. Makes sense.
Who did your design and UI? Because it's fairly good. I just checked out a little bit. Thanks, Rob. This is pretty cool.
I'm I'm quite impressed. So so so our technology team, is housed at Arby Soft. They're one of our earliest supporters as well.
Oh, yeah यार OTP आ गया. Oh, bug. शायद उसने दहेर है by design उसने उठाया और उसने कहा जी लोहौर ही है क्योंकि लोहौर ही है. The UI is great. You got some ads coming up at the top जो कि I believe कि so so how do these ads work? Are they ads ads? Do they pay for these ads? Or
So so depend मतलब मतलब eventually they will. अभी हम charge ख़ुद से नहीं कर रहे. हम उनको
Oh you are creating value once the value is there. Yeah. Only a matter of and then so अच्छा अब मैं इसमें जा रहा हूं तो मुझे discounts नज़र आ रहे हैं, top rated नज़र आ रहे हैं, new additions नज़र आ रही हैं. मैं चला जाता हूं यार सब एक ऊपर. ठीक है जी मैं मालूम कर सब बेचारा गया. 10% off welcome offer. यह जो 10% off है यह
आप customer side से मिलकर कर रहे हैं या आप अपना पैसा burn कर रहे हैं? नहीं नहीं वह यह सब restaurant देते हैं. तो यह restaurant के पास option है कि उसने क्या देना है? आप 10% off को click कीजिएगा एक बार. तो आपको आ जाएगा कि अगर आप सात दिनों में आते रहेंगे ना तो आपको पंद्रह percent unlock हो जाएगी आपकी. ठीक है. So rewards
I get. I go to smash and there is a rating and चलो follow आ गया तो मैंने उसको follow कर लिया. What does follow do for me? Notify करना शुरू कर देगा मुझे इनकी different चीज़ों को. हां. ठीक है, follow मैंने कर लिया और मैं उस पर पहुंच गया. Reviews नहीं हैं अभी भी.
वह अभी release हो रही हैं. जाएंगे release. We speak yes. Ok.
देखिए I I I mean I feel like I don't know why people aren't doing that here in Pakistan. Why don't we have a Yelp for food? It's it's such a no brainer product. Like it's everywhere all over the world. People are using it where. अभी आपको वो नज़र आ रहे होगा store के ऊपर ना 4.8
rating है उसकी. मुझे वो नज़र आ रहा और अभी अभी ये हो रहा कि review का version वन गया है कि अभी ना restaurant owner को नज़र आ रहे है reviews. अभी users को नहीं नज़र आ रहे हैं. हां. उन्होंने वही request किया restaurant owner ने कि यार अभी ना कोई यह ना कर दिया हमारा competitor भी हमें ना बुरे reviews दे दिया और आपके वहां पर नज़र आने लग गए. अभी हमें आने नहीं. Review किस तरह हो रहा है? So. आप खाना खा रहे हैं? खाना खाने के बाद ही होगा ना अगर आपने transaction pattern पर किए तभी आप review दे सकते वरना आप नहीं दे सकते so you can't bomb the reviews and you can't do any of that right? जो
जो यह this is great and I love this. What what I am failing to see in Pakistan is again जो मैंने आपको use case बताया imagine me in लोहौर right I go on this and now suddenly it's the same thing as food, food panda. कि सबसे अच्छा क्या है right? I am filled with the noise of so many restaurants and I am like यार I.
अरे आपको असल में आपको यहां यह दिखाना है कि अगर मैं और आप आज मिले है ना
right? So I go on discover and suddenly there is an entirely different ecosystem where it's discovered. So it's like the thing is छोटी सी याया की शक्ल and the 4.5 and the 4.7 doesn't do much for me as a consumer anymore because it's noisy. Every restaurant has a rating. मैं food पैंडा पर चाहता हूं. I don't do try new restaurants based on the rating. I don't even know how to how does how that works. Right? Unless I am now in a panel where it's it's that panel is filled with the top five restaurants at गुल्बर्ग right now. The hottest woe of this right now. So there are these sort of staff picks and then there are this picks and that picks where you're constantly in this mood to discover and food is like that. We've seen food जो food blogging है वह चलती है सोचते हैं because food blogging जो है because it's all about discovery and you get a new food blogger every year which simply because the fact that you know people just want to keep on discovering. Discovery हमने आज तक इस उस पर रखी हुई है कि you know got like pretty pictures and people will fall for that. It has to be a bit more human. Yes. It has to be some staff telling us about how these two restaurants are just changing the game or you know reviews like very good quality reviews telling people. So again मैं इसीलिए बार बार कहूंगा Yelp is a great place. I go to New York, I go to Chicago, I go to anywhere जहां पर Yelp exist करता है and the first thing I do is कि यार ok top five things I can do for entertainment, top five things I can go for eating and and and Yelp allowed me personally to be able to discover some very unique places like मुझे याद है मैंने New York में I had these dumplings जो कि एक alleyway में बहुत ही shady alleyway में बंदर जाकर एक अजीब ऐसी दुकान थी कि मैं मरकर भी कभी उस दुकान में enter होता and those were the best dumplings I've ever had and I discovered them through Yelp because Yelp में they had like 50,000 reviews and people were just raving about it and the restaurant didn't care कि वह जी बहुत खूबसूरत है कर ले. The review product and all उसमें line लगी हुई थी कि कोई ज़िंदगी में model नहीं था जिसके through मैं उधर तक पहुंच सकता होता then through a digital product I made my way through to that right? So लोहौर के अंदर for example when you look at old लोहौर and when you look at you know a lot of these मोहल्लाs and गलीs and जहां पर हर जगह पर एक बंदा बैठा है और वह बैठ के बेच रहा है और उसकी history और एक legacy है वह legacy capture नहीं हुई भी किसी एक जगह के ऊपर. Right? I just feel like कि again यह बड़ा दिल का मेरा करीब हुआ था I thought कि इसको इसको someone should do it if you guys can because you're onto something very interesting. So this is very interesting. If you guys are watching download the pattern app particularly if you are in लोहौर let us know in the comment section below what you think of the app and whether you are gonna use it or not and क्या इसमें चीज़ें बेहतर की जा सकती हैं या नहीं की जा सकती? Super valuable feedback. अच्छा मुझे यह बताएं या या कि चलिए यह तो समझ आ गया product तो मैं बिक गया. सच्ची बात है मैं बिक गया you guys have done a good job. I'm proud of you. मुझे यह बताएं कि what's the vision here with the with the product and what's the vision here with,
you know, where do you where do you think you're gonna be taking this over the next three to five years? Vision definitely is कि like I said brick and mortar space के लिए इतनी underserved है कि कुछ हुआ ही नहीं है और the vision is to actually be all over Pakistan for sure and then take this product internationally as well. There's so many other markets that we get reached out from के you know similar solution is needed in many other countries as well. तो Pakistan itself is a beast of its own. इतनी बड़ी opportunity है. I think the vision is definitely कि हर brick and mortar restaurant के अंदर next three to five years के अंदर grow कर रहे हो और I think the इसके अंदर अगर एक vision की एक बड़ी important highlight यह है कि we also see के globally इतने सारे हम restaurant chains सुनते हैं. आपने अभी Tim Hortons का mention किया कि start होते हैं किसी भाई की मुल्क से और फिर वो पूरी दुनिया में expand कर देते हैं. There is no, there is I don't know of any success story जो Pakistan से इतनी बेहतरीन चीज़ें हैं जो grow कर सके हों और जो हमने सबसे पहले पुछा तो वह उसका यही था कि यार एक, दो, तीन branches हम handle कर सकते हैं इसके बाद हमें नहीं पता कि grow कैसे करना है और वह essentially जो आप बड़ी जितना Starbucks की example Domino's है, McDonald's है, these are essentially technology companies who happen to sell food. Now एक restaurant अपने से इतना बड़ा हो जाए कि वह अपनी एक app इतने सारे billions of users को download करा सके is less likely और कोई हम जैसा solution empower कर दे millions of restaurants को scale करने में globally. तो I think एक एक one one personal goal that our team has is to make sure that let's take Pakistan to the to the if not global at least to the regional markets right? Like there's a huge opportunity
Middle East में there's a huge पाकिस्तानी community तो हम बाकियों को उससे पहले हम अपने पाकिस्तानियों को बहुत सारे ऐसे restaurants दे सकते हैं like कराची के इतने लोग हैं, इस्लामाबाद के इतने लोग हैं कि उनका favorite restaurant है इस्लामाबाद if that's available in Dubai you know they would love to go there. Exactly. Do you think you'll ever get into delivery? I mean I'm seeing an app that's essentially the same as food panda. So the tech stack is there, you know एक logistics का वह है.
I think, नहीं नहीं I, we were certain that we won't get into delivery because उसकी expertise वह एक different ball game altogether. तो the problem that we want to solve is on premise, in store, brick and mortar, चार दीवारी वाले restaurants और businesses. तो उनके अंदर काम बहुत होने वाले और वो एक model भी different है, approach भी different है. Delivery के अंदर बहुत सारे players हैं जिनकी बड़ी ज़बरदस्त expertise है. वह बहुत बेहतर कर सकते हैं. Do you think you'd, you'd maybe partner with someone who handles delivery? For
example I mean ecosystem है ना तो बजाय इसके क्या आप पूरा वह manage करें? तो आप कहें for example कि यार मेरी backbone जो है वह मैं सारी provide करूंगा to करीम and you know करीम के app के अंदर जो है वह जो जो food का सारा का सारा segment है वह हम deal कर रहे हैं और वह जो है या even मेरी app के अंदर उधर ही click आएगी अच्छा dine in करना है order या pickup का order करना है या delivery through करीम you know sort of or you click on that and you're able to manage that through that ecosystem. So do you think potentially that you'd be open about? Absolutely. Partnerships so I think are are the most important part of the ecosystem.
And on that point, I think अभी the the version, one of it that we're already doing is कि there are some restaurants जिनके पास पूरी fleet है अभी अपनी. तो on our platform वो dine in भी लेते हैं, वो delivery भी लेते हैं, वो take away भी लेते हैं at the same affordable price point. Ok. तो
so it's happening already. So delivery का अगर वो delivery वाला restaurant है I go there and I am so if I for example go there can I choose restaurants that have that offer delivery? Like मैं कह रही हूं. Yes. Say कि यार मुझे सिर्फ वह वाले restaurants दिखाओ जो कि delivery
वाले हैं. Filter की आपको ऐसा option होगी.
Search में, search में. Search में, ok. Go to search. Filter बना होगा. And I say, डालिल, ay, यार कमाल हो गया. हां. So interesting. So I go there and then I so I have the option to directly call the restaurant as well. This is not a helpline. This is directly to the restaurant, so you're connecting directly. I choose chicken strips. I say add to cart. I go to the cart, and I say डाढ़ा डाढ़ा डाढ़ा. Ok, delivery delivery, checkout. Delivery fee zero क्योंकि वह restaurant के ऊपर है तो वह लायक ही वह है. होशिक मार दिया. और क्या? हां?
Cancel.
अच्छा order place हो गया था I thought कि वह card जो है वह
मुझसे मांगेगा? नहीं नहीं.
So मैंने card choose किया उसने कहा उसने order place कर दिया. अभी यह card है on the counter, your physical card. तो जब delivery वाला लड़का card लेकर आएगा? हाँ, machine. Machine लेकर. Oh, but payments are also happening within the app as well. You have a checkout page. Not for all restaurants. So some restaurants मतलब
अभी यह है कि जो deal है उसके हिसाब से. हां. But नहीं नहीं और उसके हिसाब से भी नहीं और restaurant के हिसाब से भी. तो testing out phases हैं अभी. ठीक है. जिसके अंदर कोई restaurant कहता कि मुझे card की gateway से accept करनी है payment. Ok. और कोई restaurant कहता कि मुझे नहीं करनी है. अभी.
Ok, so if for example there is a, लेकिन आपके पास gateway exist करता है? हां, लेकिन वह सबसे integrated नहीं है अभी. ठीक है. Pipeline में चल रहा अभी. ठीक है, ठीक है, ठीक है, makes sense. सैया, how do you see the, the situation right now? It's a blood bath for startups. And I've I've I've said this before. Startups in Pakistan, that are inherently driven by consumption, you are driven by consumption, are playing in an economy where year on year, the total spendable wealth is decreasing. And so it's it's the the the dreams of a unicorn do not exist in Pakistan. You can shore for now. I mean, कोई भी blanket, there's no black and white anywhere. But for now, you can, yes, it's a great hard mode to play at. K? If you survive in Pakistan, you can survive potentially anywhere in the world. But the idea that this false sense of idea that we've sold where we're like you know हमारी यह consumption based startups जो हैं वह पूरे Pakistan को अमीर कर देंगे. That's not gonna happen. पैसा कहीं और से आएगा and yes once that money is coming in तो उसके दरमियान में startups can play a great role. So अभी currently हमने देखा कि जो हमारा consumption economy है वह अपने छोटे छोटे cycles में ऊपर नहीं चोटी रही है but मुझे लगता है कि वह एक बड़े cycle से भी dip पर आई हुई है और वह you know it's it's going to get a lot worse or at least एक major supply shock आएगा जिसके बाद फिर I'm I'm very hopeful कि then things are gonna become radically better because हमारी काफ़ी सारे fundamentals are pretty good. एक हमारा core है जो कि the amount of money that we have to return over the next four years पच्चीस से पच्चीस हज़ार तकरीबन साल आना जो कि हम नहीं कर सकते हैं साफ़ सी बात है. बिल्कुल. तो उसको हमने fix करना है उसकी वह debt restructuring वगैरह होनी है जिसकी वजह से हालात बहुत ज़्यादा impact करेंगे and it's going to get very very difficult for for a lot of different folks. So इस background के साथ how do you see the startup industry and by proxy your own startup. क्या आपका road map है, किस सामने plan out किया है इसको? बिल्कुल, नीनी this is a very important and great question.
So I think एक basic fundamental जो है वो यह है कि fundamental principle जो कि religiously follow करना बहुत ज़रूरी है किसी भी entrepreneur के लिए. That is to be short term paranoid and long term optimistic. तो वह तो by default है. Right.
लोग भी आप मुझे एक सी बात बोलिए because a lot of times लोग कहते हैं कि यार negativity क्यों फैला रहे हो? और काफी दफा लोग कहते हैं कि यार तुम तो बस optimist हो तुम्हें नज़र नहीं आ रहा क्या हो रहा है? Like it's not black and white. You know like things go down and then things go up and you have to look at both sides of the story. Absolutely.
तो short term paranoid in the sense कि जब आप build कर रहे हैं एक ऐसी चीज़ जो कभी नहीं हुई भी तो वह आपके really point पर है कि startup, Pakistan में startups need to be very very careful. उनको अपने business model को, उनको देखिए करनी दस चीज़ें हैं लेकिन आज क्या करना है? कैसे करना है? कितना tweak करना है? आज survive करने के लिए कि आज मैं कौन सी problem solve करनी है? आज सबसे बड़ी problem क्या है? उसको solve कैसे करना है? और उस बारे में हमेशा short term paranoid रहना है कि यार यह ना कि तो we won't be able to survive. तो वह short term paranoia is very very important because then you stay on track and then you stay sane and then you stay focused. Long term optimism is also very very important because I think that has to do with the success that has happened over decades in a lot of other countries as well. और it has to do with, you know, the the the religious belief as well कि अगर आप सही नियत से सही काम problem solve करें ना, intention बहुत matter करती है कि क्या आप इसलिए कर रहे हैं क्योंकि यह Mexico में बड़ा मशहूर हो गया था तो अब मैं भी पैसे कमा लूंगा और फिर मैं भी यह करूंगा. तो वह आप ज़्यादा देर नहीं चल पाएंगे क्योंकि it's a very painful process and you have to be very very intrinsically motivated and very honest with yourself क्योंकि दुनिया में पैसे कमाने के बहुत तरीके हैं. But अगर आपने कुछ build करना है और इस मुल्क में करना then you have to take a conscious call and then you also have to know कि मुझे सारे जवाब आज नहीं पता और बेहतरी will come as I keep going in the right direction. तो I think वह है कि short term paranoid रहें. Problem solve करने पर focus करें. Iterate करने से ना घबराएं. देखें अगर कोई चीज़ आपको लगता है कि बहुत बड़ा मसला था और मैं इसको ऐसे solve करूंगा तो सही हो जाएगा और वह नहीं हो रहा तो कोई बात नहीं. You know backtrack करें, दुबारा किसी और मस्ते को solve करने की कोशिश करें और like stay true to, you know, yourself and to the mission and and to the problem that you are solving. But also believe in the fact that वो आपकी बात बिल्कुल ठीक है कि there is a lot of challenges happening but opportunity भी exactly उन्हीं markets में होती है जहां पर challenges हैं. तो अगर तो आप कोई सही मसला और उसका एक proxy simple है कि आपकी gut feeling सबसे important होती है. आपके इर्द गिर्द the universe sends people around you as well. आपको समझ आ जाती है कि मैं जो कर रहा हूं वह सही कर रहा हूं या नहीं कर रहा You just have to listen to it. अगर आप सही कर रहे हैं, सही near से कर रहे हैं और एक भी बंदे की ज़िंदगी में बेहतरील आ रहे हैं ना, तो keep going and you know long term में things will take care of themselves. Makes sense, makes sense. How's
the financial situation of the company? Do you have good runway? Are you burning cash on getting customers? क्या situation है? And also are you looking at fundraising at this point in time? And if you are, when can we expect potentially an announcement?
Yeah, great question. So so, अलम्दुल्ला, we have a very safe runway, as of now. Thanks to we we we were lucky to be backed by very very strategic investors from across the world which have added immense value to our journey and that is also one of the reasons why we are so long term optimistic that काफी ज़्यादा अच्छी clearly opportunities नज़र आ रही हैं. In terms of burning money, I think that needs some for as well क्योंकि वो generally काफी nuanced approach होती है. So it's it's so होता ही है कि जिस तरह venture back startups for the audience के, you know, you spend some money, you build a product, you build technology, you build processes, you build a business जिसके अंदर growth आ रही होती है but sustainable growth होती है कि आपको पता है कि, you know, you can easily pinpoint. It's like a lever जो आपको पता है कि, you know, I am creating a lot of value. People are willing to pay for it and we will gradually turn the lever towards profitability and, most, you know, if there's a logical sense to it, that that's a way of sort of checking if you're on the right track. So so that's where we are right now. Our our model is pretty, straightforward and profitable. It it we don't burn any money on orders. Everything that is happening is sponsored by the restaurants when they want to. It's just a tool, it's a software platform which more and more users can use with no incremental costs. So जब दो restaurants हमारे platform को use करते हैं तब भी वही cost थी और जब 100 करें तब भी वही है और essentially thousand or 10,000 पर भी with every single order या with every single user. The costs don't exponentially scale. It's ready to scale, at a at a massive scale. And, about the announcement, so I think, yeah, so so we are currently raising a seed round and, inchallah we're we're expecting to announce within this year. स्वागत है.
एक चीज़ मैं कहना चाहूंगा, you know लोग देख ही रहे हैं मैंने startups बड़े RSS नहीं किया है, मैं बड़े RSS से कहना चाह रहा था तो I just thought कि I'll mention here. I'm on record saying कि, Pakistan में startups, you know, consumption economy are a difficult thing to do and people need to be very clear what they're doing. That doesn't mean कि Pakistan में startups नहीं हो सकती. That also doesn't mean कि तमाम startups fail हो जाएंगी. अब मसला यह है कि हमारे यहां हम बहुत excited हो जाते हैं certain, headlines को पढ़कर और फिर हम सारे के सारे उस जगह पर सोचना शुरू करते तो हम समझते हैं यही solution है. What happened in in in in twenty twenty to twenty twenty two was a boom cycle जो कि पूरी दुनिया में चल रहा था जब बहुत ज़्यादा massive cash printing हुई थी और वो cash कहीं ना कहीं जाके park होना था तो उसने जब कुछ नहीं रह गया तो उन्होंने कहा कि यार Pakistan एक बहुत अच्छी market है the fundamentals are there और उन्होंने उधर जाके park किया more than वो जो due diligence होती है ना boom cycle में वो more often than not कम हो जाती है बहुत ज़्यादा और फिर उसके बाद एक crash आता है. We are seeing that crash right now. Does that mean कि startup करना stupid है? बिल्कुल stupid नहीं है. Does that mean कि startup करना easy है? बिल्कुल भी नहीं है easy और ख़ासकर जो अगले तीन साल के हालात होंगे दो हज़ार बीस से दो हज़ार बाइस में जिसने startup किया ना उसका ठीक है उसका experience बना उसका जो कहते कि वह core DNA startup वाला नहीं बना. मेरे हिसाब से दो हज़ार बाइस से लेकर दो हज़ार पच्चीस तक जो startup कर रहा होगा और जो उसको sustain कर जाएगा मैं success की तो बात ही नहीं कर रहा success पच्चीस के बाद शुरू होगी. वह सही मार खाया हुआ होगा जो कि जिसको फिर आप कह सकते हैं कि जिसकी base होगी कि वह जाकर अगली सही successes निकालेगा और उसके उसमें जो काम कर रहे हैं वह नई breed of वह जो करीम के जिस तरह कहते ना breed of the class of करीम जिन्होंने आकर हज़ार और startups बना दी. वह उसमें होंगी so the reason why I mention जो मैं alarm bells ring करता हूं is people need to know when they are going into a startup कि this is not gonna be an easy ride for the next three years. Does is it does it mean it's impossible? No, it doesn't mean it's impossible. The economy is gonna fix itself. We're going to find wealth creation ways, services के through, IT के through, exports के through. And when that money comes in तो it's the startups that are going to allow for optimized, you know, sort of circulation of that money. And so in its eventuality मुझे personally लगता है दो हज़ार पच्चीस छब्बीस सत्ताईस वाले जो साल है उसमें फिर हम finally यह वाली startups के अंदर massive success massive investments massive growth देखेंगे और फिर एक boom cycle आएगा और जब वह boom cycle आएगा तो लोग कहेंगे मतलब भाई आप कहते थे startups जो थी वह तो fail ही होती हैं तो नहीं मैंने आज यह clip डाल दिया है. मैं उस वजह से इसको revert back करूंगा. Cyclical होती हैं चीज़ें. Down आता है, up आता है, down को भी समझना ज़रूरी है. आपको भी समझना ज़रूरी है. We're gonna wrap this up we're almost at the one hour thirty minute mark. I am gonna ask you one last question that I generally ask all of my guests and you know you're sitting in Pakistan during a very very tough time and I know for a fact how difficult it is to be a startup founder. जब नहीं वन रही कि वो कह रहा कि यार मैं तो चलो मैं काम कर रहा पैसा तो आ रहा ना. बिल्कुल. तो कोई वजह ही होती है उसकी कि बंदा optimistic होता है but if I were to ask you you know looking at Pakistan twenty seven years from now in 2050 how do you see Pakistan knowing everything you know now seeing everything that you've seen how do you see Pakistan of 2050?
I think so so my answer would be extremely optimistic. I think this is absolutely great things about to happen in Pakistan and मैं आपकी इस बात पर थोड़ा सा background और context ज़रूर share करूंगा. So for the general audience the the thing that happened in 2021, 2022, 2020 और 2021 के अंदर जो हम देखा कि you know इतनी ज़्यादा due let's say less due diligence के साथ होती उस वक्त भी थी. Less due diligence के साथ अगर money is flowing in और दुनिया की economy is booming और अब क्योंकि recession है तो फिर the money is falling out and then people are learning a lot. I think वो जो है ना वो in hindsight आज से let's say दस बीस साल बाद नज़र आएगा कि that was the most important part for the genesis let's say of the successful startup ecosystem. उसकी वजह यह है कि अगर मैं उसको एक एक investor lens बताता हूँ और फिर हमारे एक talent lens बताता हूँ तो जो investors दुनिया के सबसे बड़े investors यहाँ पर millions of dollars invest कर रहे थे, सबसे important है देखना कि उनका total fund size क्या था? Let's say अगर सौ million dollar उनके पास थे तो उसमें से एक million dollar एक starter में deploy करे थे यही देखने के लिए कि यह fail कैसे होता है? अब हमारे पास बहुत बड़ी information आ गई है कि क्या नहीं चलता? तभी आप वह racetrack complete करते हैं. I think that was very very important and in the next twenty twenty seven years वह चीज़ जो हमने पहले कभी भी नहीं देखी since the inception of Pakistan वह अब यह है कि एक there's thousands of talented individuals battle test हो जाएंगे और अब आगे क्योंकि अब वो जिस तरह अभी हम I think शुरू में discuss रहे थे कि US की economy का पच्चीस percent contribution उनसे आता है जो एक जमाने में एक startups थे और आज वो giants हैं. Right. तो वो Pakistan it we were very lucky to be living in this time जब अब Pakistan has finally reached a stage where there is an opportunity for people to come in and solve problems and not just join MNCs to follow SOPs which is, which is perfectly fine. It's a good thing to do but it's not for everybody. So, अपना build करना यहां से और this और एक चीज़ I would like to definitely comment about the bugs and e customers के there's so many people now willing to help. तो if if anybody wants to do anything right now, I think I always say this internally to to my teammates कि LinkedIn is such a powerful platform that you can literally reach out to somebody who has like twenty, twenty five years of experience of doing what you want to do they will help you. You just have to reach out. I think मैं हर conversation में बहुत ज़्यादा emphasize करता हूँ कि reach out करना बहुत ज़्यादा important है. उससे आपको बहुत ज़्यादा clarity मिल जाएगी. आपको like minded लोग मिलेंगे and then collectively चीज़ें बहुत बेहतर तरीके से solve हो सकती हैं. Last एक point बहुत ज़्यादा important है जो इस वाले topic के ऊपर that एक तुम सबसे बड़ा misconception in the country जो है ना वह है कि I have an idea and I am not going to share it because वह चोरी हो जाएगा idea. And now अलम्दुल्लाह we are getting those operators जिन्होंने करीमs of the world में, बाज़ारs of the world में, दस्तगीs of the world में, airlifts of the world में experience कर ली है और वो drive, वो spark अब ignite हो चुका है. So hopefully, inchallah, twenty fifty should be amazing Great,
100%. Yeah yeah, thank you so much for first of all giving optimism. We haven't had a lot of that from a lot of our guests recently, but you guys are doing a remarkable job and I hope inchallah to see you guys, you know, thrive, you know, once all of these bad times are over. But thank you so much for coming in. Thanks a lot for having me, इंशाला. And, राल, if you guys, do check out the app. We're gonna link it down below. Please have your team share it with my team and we'll have a link down in the description so you guys can check that out. It's available on iOS and Android both, and this we didn't get paid for this. So I genuinely want you guys to try it out. प्राचा उसका वह है मैंने इसलिए runtime download की थी. What do you think about the startup ecosystem? What do you think about the app in particular? Let us know, give us feedback. Let us know कि खाने का खाने आप किस तरह से करते हैं? आपका experience कैसा है? You know how do you discover food? Have you tried Do you know about Yelp? Do you think something like that could work in Pakistan? Do you think discounts के ऊपर आप जो है वह do you get enticed and does that affect your you know buying behavior? Let let me know in the comment section below. इसी के साथ साथ YouTube वाले like के बारे दबाएंगे engagement बढ़ेगी लोगों को तुम्हें conversation पहुंचेगी. You're watching thought behind things. Thank you so much for watching, and I'll see you in the next one.
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