Pakistan’s B2B e-commerce market Tajir successfully raised US$17 million in a round of financing led by the US venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins.

Fatima Gobi Ventures, Y Combinator Continuity Fund, Golden Gate, and other companies including AAVCF, Flexport, VentureSouq Liberty City Ventures, and other angel investors participated in this round of financing Ventures.

Tajir was founded in 2018 by two brothers Babar and Ismail Khan. The company’s goal is to target small family stores (called Kiryana stores) that have difficulty purchasing inventory through traditional wholesale channels.

Through the Tajir mobile app, small kiryana shopkeepers can purchase more than 1,000 storage units, including cooking staples, sandwiches, and biscuits. Special attention is paid to improving supply chain operations.

 Ismail emphasized the potential of Tajir target market, saying that 90% of Pakistan’s retail economy flows through these family stores. Tajir also claimed that they will help Kiryana shopkeepers increase their income by saving time.

The startup only provides convenience to small retailers in Lahore and other parts of central Punjab. But the company also plans to use the company’s latest round of financing to expand its business in Karachi. Venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins was impressed by the company’s excellent work and in her recent role called Tajir the “largest technology retail network” in Pakistan.

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Pakistan Post cash on delivery service launched across the country

E-commerce got a great start since it first started in Pakistan. Many e-commerce sites have sprung up over the years and have made a huge profit. It has become easy to shop online whether it is daily routine grocery or annual events. Everything is just one click away.

The e-commerce site operates from a single city and thus when people from all around Pakistan order things online than there is a high need of transport facility to shift this amount of goods from one place to another.

As the e-commerce business got high the courier services like Cash on Delivery. And hence services like TCS, DHL, Leopards Courier and COD services found that it is high time for business. They quickened their services.
Pakistan post has recently upgraded their COD services to compete with their competitors.

Introducing UMS COD Services:

UMS COD is the short form for the Urgent Mail Service Cash on Delivery. The aim of the service is to provide the fastest, efficient and secure service for customers in Pakistan.

The UMS COD service comes with a code that is used to verify the status of the order. The UMS COD service now extended its service for the people who have started the small businesses at home and for online magistrates.

The rates of UMS COD are as follows:

Pakistan Post has set up rules and regulations and those are as follows:

Packets, parcels and printed papers prepaid with postage of UMS fee may be transmitted by the inland post as COD articles, provided that the amount specified for remittance to the sender in the case of any such articles does not exceed Rs. 100,000/- (Rupees One Hundred Thousand Only).

The UMS-COD articles up to the value of Rs. 50,000/- will be the maximum limit for collection and payment of UMO at the doorstep of the addressee.

The UMS-COD articles exceeding the value of Rs. 50,000/- up to Rs.100,000/- will be delivered at the window of the designated Post Offices in the manner prescribed for Ordinary Money Orders.

The limit for payment of UMO other than UMS-COD will remain unchanged.

Benefits for online stores and customers

Pakistan Post is the one of the leading and largest postage and courier service in Pakistan. Introduction of UMS COD means that Pakistan Post is determined to provide its users the best possible service. It is taking this initiative to compete with the competing courier services which are new yet have gained popularity.

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Govt plans to impose Tax on eCommerce industry in Pakistan

According to the buzz the eCommerce industry is going to be taxed as per the instructions by the Government of Pakistan. The news was revealed by an anonymous source.

The report said,

“FBR has submitted a proposal for taxing e-commerce businesses that might get approved in financial budget for next year.”

 E-commerce includes the following sectors:

• Business activities taking place through internet.

• Online shopping.

• Online trade.

• Other electronic transactions through internet etc.

Why good tax policy is so Important:

The tax policy plays vital roles in the development of a country. A good tax policy ensures that all the system is managed equally and an equilibrium is created.

The eCommerce industry tax will need to create some sort of policy that will promote the link between the businessmen and business.

The rules and regulations apply.

According to the Federal Board of Revenue’s (FBR) instructions to the Chief Commissioners of Large Taxpayer Units (LTUs) and Regional Tax Offices (RTOs) the budget if year 2017-2018 is prepared and soon will be applicable.

Tax Policy Conference:

Prime Minister will appoint special assistant to head the meeting that is to be held at FBR (HQ) Islamabad on Thursday, 16th of March , 2017; under the title of  Tax Policy Conference. The meeting will welcome all the proposals for the budget 2017-2018.

FBR requested that concerned chief commissioner or a focal person/persons nominated by her/him fully conversant with the budget proposals prepared by the respective RTO/LTU should participate in the meeting to give the precious contribution towards economy of Pakistan.

FBR proposed:

• broadening of tax base;

• measures for improvement in the tax to GDP ratio;

• rationalization/analysis of tax exemptions;

• withholding taxes and their application for economic development in the country;

• taxation of e-commerce.

For assistance of the participants of Tax Policy Conference, the chief commissioner and the focal people were guided to create small presentations on budgetary proposals. The presentation will feature the solution of the problems to enhance the growth of eCommerce industry.

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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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Ann Lavin who is the Google Director of  Southeast Asia and Finance Minister of Pakistan Ishaq Dar met and at the meeting Ann Lavin suggested some ways in which Google could help to promote eCommerce Pakistan.

The two met in Islamabad on Thursday an Lavin had all the praise for Pakistan for its economic progress in the past years. She said that her company was willing to promote digitization of economy and IT development in Pakistan.

She also assured that Google is really willing to promote e-commerce in Pakistan and wants to make good investments for development.

Defence Minister Ishaq Dar also said on the occasion,

“The Government of Pakistan works on providing a level playing field to all the potential local and foreign investors.”

He also requested Ann Lavin to put forward all the plans and proposals so that they can be reviewed and the work could be started soon.

On the event Ishaq Dar also mentioned that Pakistan has a potential economy.

He said,

” Pakistan has been projected by many foreign institutions as the second best place for investment in the world. With Pakistan’s improved energy and security situation, macroeconomic stability and conducive environment for investment many new investors have also shown a keen interest to invest in IT sector of Pakistan.”

The event was graced by Google Representatives and also the Finance officials from Pakistan.

Google already is working in collaboration with Pakistan. The projects like Nest I/O, Startup Summit 2016 and many more were financed by Google.

Source: Express Tribune

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