FS Weekly 63: Nuport eyes BD’s $8bn ecommerce market, Rare Al Samir on the growth of Interactive Cares and edtech, Pickaboo turns 7, Best Business Podcasts
An in-depth profile on the fast-growing supply chain automation startup Nuport.
Fahim Salam and Christopher Li were working on a digital logistics company with an ambition to disrupt the e-commerce logistics space in Bangladesh. The idea was a result of their own earlier hurdles with logistics while building an e-commerce company. While working on the logistics, the duo realized that there was an even bigger challenge: supply chain automation for enterprise and e-commerce companies in Bangladesh.
Why not? E-commerce is said to be an $8-billion dollar market in Bangladesh. Unlike many other markets, it is a unique market in which small Facebook and social media-based players dominate the bulk of the business. Most of these players run their operations manually and consequently, face a significant bottleneck in managing and scaling their businesses. Heavy reliance on staff to run the operations makes everything inefficient and expensive.
This is the context where Nuport, a Dhaka-based ambitious full-stack supply chain automation company, comes into the story. Founded in 2021 by Fahim Salam and Christopher Li, the company builds tools and applications for e-commerce and distribution companies to automate their entire supply chain and back office so that these companies can scale and grow faster and more efficiently.
We speak with Interactive Cares Founder and CEO Rare Al Samir about the evolution of Interactive Cares, the huge opportunity in the edtech space in Bangladesh, how Interactive Cares has built a fast-growing sustainable business, the state of Interactive Cares operation today, and the strategic direction going forward, the challenges for the company today and its ambition, his lessons from his entrepreneurial journey, books, personal growth and much more.
This is a fascinating conversation that offers crystalizing insight into the fast-evolving edtech landscape in Bangladesh and one of the prominent players in it.
A profile on Dhaka-based software giant Brian Station 23.
Brain Station 23 was founded in 2006 with an ambition to build a world-class technology outsourcing company out of Bangladesh. Today, the company has a presence in over 25 markets globally, making it one of Bangladesh's largest and most fascinating technology companies. Despite its scale and growth, Brain Station 23 is one of the most underrated and least talked about tech companies in Bangladesh. The reasons are understandable. Unlike many rising consumer technology companies in Dhaka, Brain Station 23 rarely tries to be flashy and trendy. The company prefers quiet execution over fanfare.
Pickaboo, the leading omnichannel mobile and electronics products-focused e-commerce startup in Bangladesh, turned 7 years old this month. In order to give you a sense of Pickaboo’s journey up until this day, we have put together a dossier comprising the most interesting pieces we published on the company over the past years. Hopefully, it will not only help you understand Pickaboo and its past but will also offer a sense of its future.
Mohammad Ruhul Kader is a Dhaka-based entrepreneur and writer. He founded Future Startup, a digital publication covering the startup and technology scene in Dhaka with an ambition to transform Bangladesh through entrepreneurship and innovation. He writes about internet business, strategy, technology, and society. He is the author of Rethinking Failure. His writings have been published in almost all major national dailies in Bangladesh including DT, FE, etc. Prior to FS, he worked for a local conglomerate where he helped start a social enterprise. Ruhul is a 2022 winner of Emergent Ventures, a fellowship and grant program from the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He can be reached at ruhul@futurestartup.com
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