NICL Investor Summit brings together Start-up Founders with Investors and Venture Capitalists

(Lahore, April 09, 2021): National Incubation Center at LUMS, funded by Ignite and MOITT, is hosting its bi-annual Investor Summit on Saturday, April 10th, 2021 from 9:00am to 6:30pm PKST.  

The Investor Summit serves as the capstone event of NICL’s Foundation Program, meant to provide real-world experience and access to entrepreneurial youth.  In the past several months, incubatees recruited from all over Pakistan, have received 130+ hours of instruction from LUMS faculty members and industry consultants across 50+ sessions; 150+ hours of 1:1 mentorship from LUMS alumni and corporate leaders at Amazon, Google to JPMorgan and McKinsey; and attended guest talks by 10+ investors, industry and technology specialists.

NIC at LUMS is an effort to inspire, enable and facilitate problem solvers, with a mandate to expand outreach to those who lack access. The flagship event will bring together 35+ early-stage start-ups incubated at NIC Lahore and Quetta who will pitch their ventures in agritech, cleantech, edtech, healthtech and fintech, to seasoned investors and start-up founders in Pakistan.  

These ventures include Pakistan’s first shariah compliant buy-now-pay-later service; cost-effective prosthetics for amputees that utilise 3D scanning and printing technology; a bio sensor chip to monitor and reduce toxins in crops and improve nutrition; identifying shoplifters in real time by using AI; an automatic low-cost roti making appliance; logistical solutions to increase cargo capacity; an e-commerce aggregator for fashion brands; and a food delivery service that empowers female entrepreneurs who prepare meals at home. 

This year, the Summit boasts a panel of seasoned angel investors and venture capitalists active in Pakistan including Ali Mukhtar (Founder, Fatima Ventures), Aatif Awan (Founder, Indus Valley Capital), Faisal Aftab (Partner, Lakson Venture Capital), Yusuf Hussain (Head, HBL VC), Ali Irfan Najam and Salman Gaba (Senior Associates, 47 Ventures), Hammad Umer (Pakistan Director, Insitor Impact Asia Fund), Ali Farid Khwaja (Chairman, KASB Securities), and Omer Ghani (Pakistan National Investment Portal).  

They will be joined by successful start-up founders including Muneeb Maayr (Founder, Bykea), Qasif Shahid (Finja), Usman Javaid (Ricult), Badar Khushnood (Co-founder, Fishry.com), Hamza Iqbal (Founder, Healthwire) and Zehra Ali (Founder, Ghonsla).  

The event will take place virtually, and will be livestreamed on NICL’s facebook page: (https://www.facebook.com/NICLSolveTogether). Interested audience can join in to encourage our nascent entrepreneurial ecosystem, and help our youth realize its potential. The audience will be able to submit comments, and participate in live poll to help promote preferred start-ups.