A decade or so ago, many people weren’t even aware of the term ‘start-up’, which according to some is a fashionable word used for ‘entrepreneurship’. However, of late, this phenomenon is spreading like wildfire.
Start-ups could be small entities but they can play a very important role in the overall economic growth – they create more jobs, which translates to more employment, and more employment means an improved economy. Further, start-ups also have what it takes to contribute to economic dynamism by spurring innovation and injecting competition as new entrepreneurs bring new ideas to the table leading to innovation and generating competition.
However, innovative ideas can only amount to action within a system that’s built to nurture them as entrepreneurs need a supportive environment to launch start-ups that could one day have an impact not only on the local economy but on society at large as start-ups do not and cannot exist in vacuum and are born in a specific context as parts of an entity – a network, a system – much bigger than themselves where entrepreneurs are supported by a community of people, organisations and other start-ups that surround them. This is what is referred to as a start-up ecosystem, which is lately springing up in all corners of the world.
However, as far as Bangladesh is concerned, the start-up ecosystem here experts maintain has a lot of potential but is faced with several challenges including lack of systematic branding in an effort to attract more foreign investments, Government policy support, arrangement of corporate venture capital and enhanced industry-academia collaboration to propel the growth of start-ups which can make great contributions to the national economy.
Presenting the keynote paper at a recent seminar, Founding Partner & CEO of Anchorless Bangladesh and Senior Advisor to the NSU Start-ups Next Rahat Ahmed said Bangladeshi start-ups drew around US $ 40 million in the last calendar year which was rather insignificant compared to other regions.
“For its population size and density coupled with continuous economic growth, Bangladeshi start-ups have been funded with US $ 0.92 per person that is an incredible contrast to India and Indonesia, both above US $ 30,” underlined Rahat.
Launched in 2019 by Rahat Ahmed in New York, New York Anchorless Bangladesh is an early-stage venture investment fund focused on fostering the start-up ecosystem, which empowers founders, investors, the start-up community and other stakeholders to realise their objectives as well as strengthen the economy while NSU Start-ups Next or NSUSN is North South University’s (North South University is Bangladesh’s leading private university) own incubator even as the programme is designed to inspire innovation and support founders who want to scale their start-ups.
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At NSUSN, founders will learn from experts, form strong connections with those in the start-up ecosystem and build a network, to create strong foundations for the rest of their journey as entrepreneurs — and involves collaborations with academicians, stakeholders and industry experts with the aim to nurture the entrepreneurship spirit and assist young founders.
Participating in the discussion, Dr. Abdul Hannan Chowdhury, who is the Dean of the School of Business & Economics of North-South University highlighted the role of academic institutions for creating an enabling environment for the start-ups, who went on to add that there are plenty of start-ups and successful businesses established in the country but the question looms around getting global class CEOs or founders.
“We are yet to go a long way… Our academic system needs to incorporate many advanced topics which are very pertinent at this moment, in terms of technology, the analytics part and all sorts of digital marketing and some aspects of frontier technologies,” maintained Dr. Abdul Hannan Chowdhury, adding, “We are behind in terms of leadership training, we are behind in terms of even pushing our students to go for entrepreneurship rather than focusing heavily on working under somebody else,” even as President of Pathao, Fahim Ahmed, on his part added that start-up operators face challenges related to scaling, competitiveness and capital.
“Many companies falter in the problem identification, some are not ambitious enough in identifying a problem and scale up with the solution,” said Fahim sharing his experience with Pathao, a local start-up providing a wide range of services, even as he underlined it is imperative to approach with a start-up mindset within the business operations.
Pathao started its journey as a delivery service back in 2015 with its fleet of motorcycles and bicycles and acted as a delivery service for several e-commerce companies of Bangladesh even as reports maintained this Bangladeshi on-demand digital platform and vehicle for hire company boasts of ride-sharing services, food delivery, courier and e-commerce services.
Meanwhile, responding to a query, Fahim said there was a need for greater collaboration among the Government agencies especially related to regulations in a bid to establish an inclusive ecosystem though the Government has initiated a number of platforms for funding and incubating the start-ups even as Investment Associate of Luge Capital, Laviva Mazhar said there are huge opportunities in Bangladesh’s start-up ecosystem considering the huge market against the size of the population.
Sharing her experience with investment management in Canadian start-ups, she said: “I think it is possible to build a huge business because of the population in Bangladesh even without the need to expand in cross-border region,” even as she added that since start-ups are getting more attention across the globe, new funding opportunities are also being created, while underlining that a national ecosystem has to have some qualifications to attract international venture capital. Sadruddin Imran, who is the Chairman & CEO of Innovision Consulting, on his part added that there is a strong need for promoting the success of the Bangladeshi start-up entities and the potentials of the country’s start-up ecosystem.
“As a country, Bangladesh is very poor in communicating. A lot of things are happening that are interesting but remain unknown to outside world,” said Imran even as Transformation leader at Collibra Inc. Shamma Raghib — Collibra is the data intelligence company, which accelerates trusted business outcomes by connecting the right data, insights and algorithms to all data citizens even as its cloud-based platform connects IT and the business to build a data-driven culture for the digital enterprise —said there are still huge untapped opportunities in Bangladesh but numerous problems need to be solved in areas like traffic and agricultural supply chain.
She also stressed the need for identifying and tackling the local problems having global relevance especially in neighbouring countries to move ahead with the start-up operations while Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Light Castle Partners Bijon Islam — Bijon is the Co-founder and CEO of Light Castle Partners, an organisation that focuses on creating data-driven opportunities for growth and impact for development partners, corporates, SMEs and start-ups — suggested creating global brand perception and reforming the market entry process in Bangladesh to strengthen the start-up ecosystem.
We need to systematically and consistently promote Brand Bangladesh by emulating successful competitors, said Bijon even as he suggested creating advocates from globally acclaimed Bangladeshis or influential non-resident Bangladeshis to reach out to prospective investors and create positive association.
Meanwhile, Indian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Vikram Doraiswami underlined that huge potential exists in start-up collaboration even as India sees massive opportunities in collaborations with Bangladesh regarding fostering start-ups.
“There is a unique opportunity for Bangladesh and India to work together in the start-up sector, particularly to make cultural products and content,” reportedly stated Vikram, adding, “Since Bengali is an official language of both countries, these services could reach South Asian audiences all over the world.”
The Indian envoy came up with this observation during the first of a six-episode webinar titled, Shotoborsho Shotoasha-Rise Up, jointly organised by the Indian High Commission in Dhaka, Start-up Bangladesh, Ministry of Information and Communication Technology, and Start-up India.
Participating in the event, State Minister for ICT, Zunaid Ahmed Palak said a big chunk of the population in both countries were young, talented and tech-savvy while adding India has developed its start-up ecosystem to a great extent despite facing many challenges in the process.
Bangladesh has enjoyed growth in the sector as well but could still learn a lot from India’s journey in order to avoid repeating the same mistakes, Palak added while inviting 50 Indian start-ups to visit Bangladesh and meet a matching number of their local counterparts and exchange views to facilitate further collaboration even as Doraiswami reiterated Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s invitation for 50 Bangladeshi start-ups to visit India for the same reason.
Various tech and financial analysts and entrepreneurs from India and Bangladesh, while sharing their experiences, suggested that while the private sector would be taking initiatives, the public sector should provide policy support even as Wasim Alim, Co-founder of Chaldal, shared insights on how his e-commerce start-up has scaled up over the years.
“The online consumer goods provider, which now employs about 2,600 people, played a critical role by serving its customers amid the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic,” said Wasim, thanking the Bangladesh Government for providing support.
Going by views and opinions as shared by the experts, it would not be wrong to maintain that there exists a very potent start-up ecosystem in Bangladesh, which if given the proper support and conducive atmosphere, can play a very significant role in helping flourish new business that could contribute towards the overall growth and development of the economy while also open up new employment opportunities for young and educated youth of the country.
