• UAE-based venture capital firm VentureSouq, has participated in Pakistan-based B2B marketplace Tajir's $17 million growth funding round, led by US firm Kleiner Perkins and YC Continuity, Y Combinator’s investment arm for growth-stage startups.
• Other investors participating in this round include AAVCF, Fatima Gobi Ventures, Flexport, Golden Gate Ventures, Liberty City Ventures, as well as several angel investors. 
• Last year, VentureSouq also invested in the startup's $1.8 million Seed round. Since then, Tajir claims that its platform has over 1,000 products and its revenue has increased tenfold.
• Founded in 2019 by siblings Ismail and Babar Khan, Tajir is a marketplace that enables owners of small stores, known as kiranas, to source and buy inventory from manufacturers and wholesalers. It also helps its users get their products delivered to their shops by the next day.

Press release

Tajir, a Lahore-based B2B E-commerce marketplace has raised a $17M Series A round, led by American VC firm Kleiner Perkins, with participation from Y Combinator Continuity Fund, AAVCF, Fatima Gobi Ventures, Flexport, Golden Gate Ventures, Liberty City Ventures, VentureSouq, and angel investors including Flexport CEO Ryan Petersen and Figma CEO Dylan Field.

Founded in 2018 by Babar and Ismail Khan, Tajir sells inventory to small, family-owned convenience stores across Pakistan through its mobile app. Currently, a lot of these stores face challenges including, overpaying for inventory, failing to get stock when they need it and as a result making lower sales. 

With Tajir, these stores can order inventory at their convenience, receive on-demand delivery, enjoy transparent and competitive prices, and choose from a wide selection of products.

Babar Khan, co-founder of Tajir commented “When consumers walk into small mom and pop stores they often find the products they want out of stock. Stores are often unable to provide the brands that consumers actually want to buy since retail is so fragmented in Pakistan. We’re doing for stores in Pakistan what Amazon did for consumers in the U.S.”

Mamoon Hamid, partner at Kleiner Perkins added “Their software and mission to improve that supply chain and availability of products and pricing and digitizing that process made a ton of sense,” Hamid says. “I thought that would be the first foray for a company to make an attempt at doing a lot more to be a consumer company, not just a wholesale company.”

Tajir plans to use the new funds to expand to Karachi, one of Pakistan’s largest cities.