According to a statement on Monday, a Pakistani fintech, OneLoad, owned and operated by EP Systems, a subsidiary of Systems Limited, received $11 million in funding from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation recently which was an addition to the financial capital secured by the same in last year. Systems Limited, a Pakistani public technology company, disclosed the development in a filing to the Pakistan Stock Exchange (PSX).
Read more: Pakistani startups raise over $200 Million
The investment round was led by Sarmayacar and Shorooq Partners, a leading Abu Dhabi-based venture capital firm, read the statement.
Sarmayacar backs daring entrepreneurs building market-transforming technology startups in Pakistan.
🇵🇰 Lahore-based FinTech @oneloadpk raises $11M Series A.
Learn more about Oneload 🚀 https://t.co/HLGiucfm9j
💰 The round was led by @Sarmayacar and @ShorooqPartners, with participation from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and @SystemsLtd.#fintech #pakistan #startups
— MAGNiTT (@MAGNITT) August 1, 2022
OneLoad intends to use the latest funding for company expansion, including the launch of several new products and the expansion of services in the unbanked Pakistani market.
In early 2020, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) announced an investment in OneLoad, one of Pakistan’s first fintech products to get IFC funding.
“The strategic collaboration with regulated financial partners and banks has led to daily disbursements worth Rs10+ million, which created horizons of accelerated growth for numerous micro-retailers across the country,” as stated by the company.
Last year, OneLoad processed around $100 million in transactions through its 40,000 agents. According to Bloomberg, the company’s founder and CEO, Muhammad Yar Hiraj, seeks to expand daily transactions to one million from the existing level of up to 400,000.
OneLoad facilitates customers with mobile top-ups, internet packages, and media and entertainment services. Under banking access, OneLoad enables money transfers, utility bill payments, deposits and withdrawals for digital wallets, wallet account opening and biometric verification, and government-to-person (G2P) payments – in partnership with banks.
The company hopes to become the “largest banking platform in the country for the unbanked world, the financially excluded market,” Muhammad Yar Hiraj, founder and chief executive officer at OneLoad said in an interview. “The aim is to become the largest micro branch for the the unbanked without actually owning any branch.”
In an interview, Muhammad Yar Hiraj, founder and CEO of OneLoad, stated that the company aspires to be the “biggest banking platform in the country for the unbanked world, the financially excluded market. Our goal is to become the largest micro branch for the unbanked without owning any branches.”
Pakistan, the world’s fifth-most populated country, made headlines last year when it received a record $350 million in startup funding. According to the World Bank, the country has a total unbanked population of 110 million adults, ranking third only to India and China.
In addition, last week, Pakistan’s fintech Dbank also announced that it has raised $17.6 million, the largest seed-round in the country’s history backed by US-based Sequoia Capital.
Read more: How tech startups can help boost Pakistan’s economy
This is a ray of hope that the country will come out of the crisis and prosper as it would attract more investors to invest their capital in Pakistan. Moreover, it is also an encouragement for other startups to stay positive and put efforts to secure foreign funding. Renowned economists of the country like Dr. Nadeem-Ul-Haq believe that growth and investment are the forces which can drive the economy out of these crisis.