Sarmayacar announces $30M venture fund for Pakistani startups

Sarmayacar announced today the first close of Sarmayacar Ventures, a $30M venture capital fund dedicated to investing in Pakistani startups. Domiciled in the Netherlands, the fund will invest cheques of $100K to $2M into companies primarily in the technology and technology-enabled sectors, and be led by Rabeel Warraich (Founder/CEO) and Dr. Bernhard Klemen (International Partner).

“Our objective with Sarmayacar Ventures is to invest in the future of Pakistan, and at the same time generate superior returns for our investors. We are excited about the emerging opportunities in the country, particularly in the venture space, underpinned by attractive demographics and a strong digitisation push across many segments of the economy,” said Rabeel Warraich, Founder and CEO. “We want to combine our expertise with the financial firepower that this fund provides to back the most promising entrepreneurs building the next iconic Pakistani companies. We are grateful for the confidence our investors have shown in us, and our hope is that more investors, both local and international, follow these small initial steps and direct more risk capital towards the budding entrepreneurial ecosystem of Pakistan.”

“We see Pakistan as one of the last remaining untapped markets of an attractive scale,” said Dr. Bernhard Klemen, International Partner. “The stage of development of the entrepreneurial ecosystem in Pakistan allows us to build bridges and bring learnings and expertise from internatio

nal ecosystems. Our aim is to provide value-add capital together with access to our diverse, highly experienced investor base as well as international domain experts – spearheaded by our lead investor Jan Bolz, former board member of Electronic Arts – in order to support local talent in company building and mitigate the scarcity of smart capital in Pakistan.”