The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has officially granted a license to KOKO Tech Pakistan (Private) Limited, a subsidiary of Alibaba Group, to operate Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) services in Pakistan.

According to the SECP, KOKO Tech Pakistan will introduce modern, AI-powered credit assessment systems along with globally proven digital infrastructure. This is expected to bring more innovative and data-driven financing solutions to the local market.

The initiative aims to improve access to consumer financing, especially for young individuals, freelancers, and small businesses that often face challenges in obtaining loans through traditional banking systems.

With the backing of Alibaba’s global expertise and strong financial resources, KOKO Tech Pakistan is well-positioned to support small and medium enterprises (SMEs), promote e-commerce growth, and contribute to Pakistan’s transition towards a more inclusive, technology-driven financial ecosystem.

The SECP also noted that this move represents a direct inflow of foreign investment into Pakistan’s financial sector.

Speaking on the development, SECP Chairman Dr Kabir Ahmed Sidhu said that the entry of Alibaba Group will enhance competition and drive innovation in the country.

He further added that Pakistan continues to be an attractive destination for international investors, thanks to its large population, increasing digital adoption, and improving regulatory environment.

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The platform, named Wukong, enables businesses to automate complex workflows by coordinating multiple AI agents within a single interface. It can handle tasks such as document editing, spreadsheet management, meeting transcription, and research, making it a comprehensive productivity tool. Currently, Wukong is available through an invitation-only beta program.

The launch follows the company’s recent restructuring under the newly formed Alibaba Token Hub (ATH) business group, highlighting a stronger focus on enterprise-level AI solutions. Wukong is positioned as the flagship product of the Wukong Business Unit within ATH.

Read: Nvidia bets on AI inference as chip revenue opportunity hits $1 trillion

Users can access Wukong either as a standalone desktop application or via DingTalk, Alibaba’s workplace collaboration platform used by over 20 million corporate users.

In addition, the platform is expected to integrate with other popular communication tools such as Slack, Microsoft Teams, and WeChat, according to the company’s official statement.

The move comes amid rising interest in AI agent technologies in China, largely driven by the popularity of OpenClaw, an open-source AI agent tool that has recently gained traction across the tech community.

This growing trend has pushed major tech players, including ByteDance, Tencent, and AI startup Zhipu AI, to introduce similar solutions, despite increasing concerns from regulators over potential security risks.

Chinese companies, many of which provide open-source AI models that are free to download, have significantly reduced token prices as competition intensifies across the domestic market.

Leading models such as DeepSeek, Qwen, and ChatGLM are now priced 10 to 20 times lower than their U.S. counterparts. This aggressive pricing strategy is helping Chinese firms expand their global footprint, but it is also raising concerns about long-term profitability in the sector.

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Alibaba.com, a leading platform for global business-to-business (B2B) trade, will take part as the Gold Sponsor in the 24th Textile Asia International Trade Fair, the largest textile trade fair in South Asia, which is set to be held in Karachi from 10 to 12 March 2023. Small and medium-sized businesses are cordially invited to meet the Alibaba.com team at booths D49 and D50 in Hall 4 at the biannual exhibition.

In this three-day event, visitors to the Alibaba.com booth will be able to learn about export e-commerce trends and how to start global export with Alibaba.com, as well as consult Alibaba.com experts one-on-one on potential solutions that suit their business needs. The fair is expected to attract attendance by more than 42,000 visitors and over 480 exhibitors from around the world, making it a golden opportunity for textile suppliers in Pakistan to get to know the global market trends, buyer behaviors and the potential of Pakistani textile products in the global market.

“We at Alibaba.com are excited to be the Gold Sponsor of this esteemed event to help facilitate more idea and business exchange among companies in the textile sector. Pakistani textile exporters on Alibaba.com are making a mark for themselves among global buyers, and we would like to open the door to online business opportunities wider for local textile suppliers visiting the fair,” said Mr. Rocky Lu, Head of Alibaba.com Pakistan.

“We’re thrilled to have Alibaba.com as the Gold Sponsor of the 24th Edition of South Asia’s largest textile industry exhibition, Textile Asia 2023! Alibaba.com has been serving businesses since 1999 and is a leading e-commerce platform for B2B wholesale trade, having millions of users on board from around the world. I would like to urge all businesses to not miss out on this exciting opportunity to connect and learn from the best in the business, this March 10th to 12th, 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM, at the Karachi Expo Centre! Meet and greet with their team and find out how you can take your business to the next level with global e-commerce,” says Uzair Nizam, Project Director, Textile Asia Exhibition – Ecommerce Gateway Pakistan (Pvt) Ltd.

Event registrations are now open for interested parties. Please sign up and book your free consultation slot at the Alibaba.com booth in the fair at: [http://bit.ly/3mb3Nyp].

About Alibaba.com

The first business unit of Alibaba Group, Alibaba.com is a leading platform for global B2B e-commerce that aims to make it easy to do business anywhere. Launched in 1999, Alibaba.com is engaged in services covering all aspects of commerce, including providing businesses with tools that help reach a global audience for their products and helping buyers discover products, find suppliers, and place orders online fast and efficiently. It serves millions of buyers and suppliers from over 200 countries and regions around the world.

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Daraz, South Asia’s leading eCommerce platform and Alibaba Cloud, the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group, have forged a partnership to power Pakistan’s digitalisation. The parties signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) to appoint Daraz as a partner to offer Alibaba cloud computing services in Pakistan.

The signing of the MOU is witnessed by Her Excellency Ms Rukhsana Afzaal, High Commissioner for Pakistan in the presence of Mr Bjarke Mikkelsen CEO and Founder of Daraz and Mr. Derek Wang, General Manager of South Asia and Singapore, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence. This move is in line with the Pakistan government’s ‘Digital Pakistan Vision’ to bolster the IT industry by building a digital ecosystem.

Alibaba acquires Pakistan’s eCommerce platform Daraz.pk Founded in 2015, Daraz Pakistan is one of the most well-known brands in Pakistan. Daraz has more than 40 million active monthly users and over 100,000 active sellers. Daraz University, Daraz’s online learning centre, offers personalised and localised courses covering all areas of the e-commerce ecosystem. It gives small and medium enterprises the skills to unlock their business online. Together with Alibaba Cloud’s leading cloud computing capabilities, such as networking, and artificial intelligence, both parties will support Pakistan’s digital economy with higher adoption of cloud services.

“We are glad to partner with Daraz to bring digitalization opportunities to Pakistan, and by offering our proven cloud computing services, we are confident to support Daraz in building up Pakistan’s digital momentum to benefit the wider ecosystem,” said Dr Derek Wang, General Manager for South Asia and Singapore, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence.

Daraz’s purpose is to uplift the communities where we operate, and through digitalisation, we can play a significant role in growing the digital economy in Pakistan. We look forward to increasing cloud adoption in the public and private sectors in Pakistan and making Alibaba Cloud accessible to SMEs and B2B sector in Pakistan,” said Mr Bjarke Mikkelsen, Daraz Chief Executive Officer.

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Alibaba acquires Pakistan’s eCommerce platform Daraz.pk

Alibaba has expanded its e-commerce operations into South Asia after their acquisition of Daraz.pk in an undisclosed deal.

Daraz.pk was founded in 2012 by Rocket Internet and today it operates in Pakistan as well as Bangladesh, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Nepal. Rocket said in a statement that Alibaba has acquired the entire Daraz business.

Alibaba acquires the entire share capital of Rocket Internet’s Daraz.PK Business. The acquisition is the second time Alibaba has bought a Rocket company, the first being Lazada in Southeast Asia two years ago.

The deal’s financial details were not disclosed. In mid-March, it was reported that the acquisition talks were ongoing.

Pakistan have a population of over 190 million which is good for Alibaba to make business.

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Alibaba Group that operates from China is one of the most famous e-commerce companies of China.
Recently, a delegation from Alibaba Group visited Pakistan. Before this the Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif met the Chairman of the Alibaba Group, Jack Ma at World Economic Forum 2017. There Jack Ma had shown great interest in investing in eCommerce of Pakistan.

Now, during the meeting with the Finance Minister of Pakistan, Mr. Ishaq Dar, and the delegation from China representing Alibaba Group confirmed that the Chairman of Alibaba Group, Mr. Jack Ma, is interested to start a new e-commerce platform in Pakistan.

The delegation was led Max Bittner. The meeting was held at Islamabad and other officials were also present at the meeting.

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar in a meeting with the delegation of Alibaba group in Islamabad on Friday. PHOTO: PID

During their stay, the members of Alibaba Group developed a positive image of Pakistan regarding the efforts and contributions of Pakistan towards e-commerce and IT development. They were very impressed by the way Pakistan has made progress in the fields of IT, Telecom and Broadband penetration.

Finance Minister Ishaq Dar shared that he believes that e-commerce has a great contribution towards economic development. He said that he believes in promoting small business so that these businesses can grow to a great level and can give maximum benefits to the country and its economy.

According to the Minister,

“e-commerce has been doubling in size every year and is projected to surpass US $ 1 billion in 2020. He also remarked that Pakistan has 3G, 4G technologies and more than 11% people are using mobile banking solutions for financial transactions.”

The Minister also said, Pakistan has an adequate ICT infrastructure in place for facilitating fast developing e-commerce sector and there was exponential growth in mobile broadband access to nearly 26 million people.

Expanding the e-commerce would promote socio-economic development and provide employment to many people including women.

We also heard, Alibaba group is interested in acquisition of Pakistan’s largest e-commerce store daraz.pk. Lets wait  for Alibaba Pakistan the big news in coming days soon.

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Alibaba Group Holding Limited is one of the global e-commerce giant. It seems quite interested in the information technology market in Pakistan. Why not? The information technology in Pakistan is growing rapidly and many young and talented people are getting associated with this field. This is making Pakistan a very HOT DESTINATION for investment.

Alibaba is also impressed with the growth of Pakistani economy and specially e-commerce sector, taking the advantage of the correct time and circumstanced Alibaba intends to invest in Pakistan. Before it does so, it is testing the response of the market by launching some of its ventures.

Though recently, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Jack Ma, the founder of Alibaba Group met where they discussed about World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in which the premier invited Alibaba to explore the growing e-commerce opportunities in Pakistan, the new initiative has nothing to do with it.

It is not the result of meeting but an interest that has developed in Alibaba’s authorities to invest in Pakistani market after observing its current status.

Alibaba has already launched a UCWeb last year in Pakistan. It is a mobile internet company that provides mobile browsing service with the help of UC Browser. The initiative was launched formally.

There is another venture that is no yet formally launched but it has set its step in Pakistan and that is AliExpress. It is an e-commerce ancillary that works in the retail segment in different countries.

AliExpress seems to be a great success already. It has managed to bag 15,000 orders per day in Pakistan. The group keeps looking forward for more opportunities, which is the reason it has recently signed an agreement with local company. According to the agreement the local company intends to provide vendors for smooth operations in Punjab’s first and second-tier cities initially.

The training sessions and work on necessary infrastructure is yet not completed and is in process that is the reason AliExpress has not been launched in Pakistan formally.

Andrea Huang is the Mobile Business Group Head of Marketing in Emerging Markets of Alibaba. According to her UCWeb has acquired 25.3% market share in Pakistan, second after Google Chrome and Firefox.

Huang during an interview over Skype has said,

“We have decided to fully market our product here as we are successfully leading in China, India and Indonesia with a global customer base of 420 million active users. The immense growth in 3G and 4G connections in Pakistan, coupled with a population of over 190 million, was the biggest attraction for formally launching the group’s product.”

Huang also said during the interview,

“It is not easy to penetrate Pakistan’s market in the presence of other web browsers; the biggest challenge is to widen the user base and provide users the best available services within the browser.”

She further added,

“For this, we are investing in our product to keep finding the demand and better services. At present, we don’t have a formal office in Pakistan, but once we expand out of Lahore, Karachi and Islamabad, we will hire a team and open up offices in Pakistan.”

The cloud computing technology was introduced by UC Browser. It became the first ever mobile browser to do so. They took this initiative back in 2004. Huang remained silent about the plans of authorities of UC Web that include Pakistan but she assured that they will keep investing in the upcoming years.

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Chairman Alibaba Group Jack Ma met Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos. —Nafees Zakaria/Twitter

The Prime Minister of Pakistan Nawaz Sharif met the chairman of Alibaba Group Jack Ma on sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

The two met this Wednesday and during the meeting Jack showed great interest in investing in e-commerce sector of Pakistan.

Jack Ma has been reported to have said,

“We are ready to invest for establishing an e-commerce platform in Pakistan. Our company was closely monitoring progress of Pakistan’s e-commerce sector.”

Ma also added that he  really wishes to invest in small scale industries of Pakistan. According to stats that were provided by the chairman of Alibaba to the Prime Minster, the Alibaba group has been aiding 60 million companies across the world.

He also said,

” China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) would provide opportunities for promotion of the bilateral economic ties between China and Pakistan.”

The Prime Minister was invited by Jack to visit Guangzhou, China where Alibaba has headquarters. On the occasion Nawaz Sharif could not stop himself in praising efforts of Alibaba and the services of Jack.

One of China’s most prestigious and top in online commerce that has user range 90 per cent of the consumer-to-consumer market.

Pak-China friendship has benefited both the countries hope this makes the bond stronger and give benefit to all Pakistan eCommerce.

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