TCS’s Yayvo eyes foreign funds to compete Alibaba in Pakistan

KARACHI: Ecommerce portal Yayvo.com, owned by logistics leader TCS, is eager to join forces with a foreign partner to compete with Alibaba’s Daraz in fast-growing online shopping market of Pakistan, its head said on Monday.

“We are looking for whoever will be the best strategic partner,” Adam Dawood, head of Yayvo told The News.

“We have been growing with double-digit rate every other year,” Dawood said. He declined to share the size of the proposed fund.

Dawood last week told Bloomberg that Yayvo is planning to bring in new investors amid competition from Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. The e-commerce company has appointed advisers to help with the fundraising, Yayvo’s head said.

Yayvo aims to start meeting with potential investors in the Middle East and China next month, according to Dawood.

“We want to bring in experts who can help us grow faster and bring in more money to the point that we can grow much, much faster,” he told Bloomberg. “We are actually looking for the right investors who can come in, be very strategic investors, who can help out with our future plan.”

Yayvo’s valuation before the fundraising is estimated at around $100 million, people with knowledge of the matter said, asking not to be identified because the information is private. Dawood declined to comment on the company’s valuation.

Yayvo, founded in 2014, sells more than 150,000 products from detergent to mobile phones and televisions on its website. TCS has a network of more than 950 outlets that make about 500,000 deliveries a day.

Pakistan’s rising middle class and young population have turned it into one of the world’s fastest-growing retail markets.

Last year Chinese ecommerce giant Alibaba acquired Pakistan-based leading online retailer Daraz Group for an estimated $150 to $200 million.

Berlin-based tech incubator Rocket Internet said Alibaba Group acquired the entire share capital of South Asian ecommerce platform Daraz Group for an undisclosed amount. Daraz also operates online marketplaces in Bangladesh, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Nepal. It was founded in 2012 in Pakistan, and has since grown into the most popular online shopping destination in the country.

Ant Financial Services Group, an affiliate of Alibaba, also agreed to acquire 45 percent stake worth around Rs20 billion in a subsidiary of Norwegian Telenor to broaden access to financial services through digital payment solutions in Pakistan. Completion of the transaction is subject to customary regulatory approvals. Ant’s technology Alipay, the world’s largest digital payment platform, would bring mobile payment and inclusive financial services to individuals as well as small and micro businesses in Pakistan where 90 percent of online orders of around Rs10 billion are fulfilled using cash-on-delivery.