[Transcript] #44: Pathao - From Ride Sharing & Food Delivery to building the largest mobility platform in Bangladesh
Transcript for podcast originally recorded on December 18, 2021
😉 Hello Afrobility readers and listeners!
In December 2021, we explored the story of Pathao - the largest mobility tech platform in Bangladesh. Pathao is the largest mobility tech platform and one of the pioneering tech companies in Bangladesh. They provide more than just motorbike sharing, offering:
Pathao Car ridesharing (similar to Uber and Bolt)
Pathao Food delivery (akin to DoorDash in the US or Deliveroo in the UK)
Pathao Courier services
A touch of FinTech with their BNPL (Buy Now, Pay Later) service launched at the end of 2021
This is a legendary Afrobility episode as it’s the longest we’ve ever recording (almost 3 hours). Shoutout to Shammi, who joined us to tell the story on this episode.
Companies discussed: Pathao, bKash, Uber, GoJek, Shohoz, Tootle, Chalo, RC Ventures & Battery Road Digital Holdings
Business concepts discussed: Ride-sharing platforms, Transportation in emerging markets, Transportation + FinTech Super apps
Enjoy!
Olumide Ogunsanwo
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Adamantium Fund: African B2B fund focused on education, health, finance, food and transportation (Website & memo)
Firedom Book: Financial Independence stories of African Immigrants (Website, Substack Newsletter & Buy: Print, eBook or Audiobook)
Transcript starts here
[00:00:00] Olumide Ogunsanwo: Welcome to Afrobility, a conversation about African business and technology. Today we're going to talk about Pathao, the largest mobility tech platform in Bangladesh. We'll explore the Pathao story across six different areas. One, transportation platforms in all the emerging markets. Two, Bangladesh's transportation context. Three, Pathao's launched early history in fundraising. Four, it's a product of monetization strategy. Fifth, it's competitive positioning, potential exit options. And then six, we'll end with our overall outlook. This episode was recorded on November 21 and December 5th, 2021.
B. Cash Flow. How’s it going?
[00:00:36] Bankole Makanju: B. Cash flow is coming back for a reason. Like the back of a jersey. That's what Prosperity Gospel tells you to do, which is to name it. And clean it. .
[00:00:46] Olumide Ogunsanwo: Exactly. B, cash flow. It's very apt for this episode because the last time we used B cash flow, we're talking about bKash and today we're talking about another Bangladesh company. And we're talking about Pathao today.
[00:00:54] Bankole Makanju: Yes, Pathao. So as part of our bike sharing series, I think it's important to look at the different bike sharing companies at different stages of evolution. So later today we'll include a clip from what we've previously discussed.
Probably the granddaddy of them all, which is Gojek, the granddaddy as far as most advanced, but also the granddaddy as the sugar daddy investor in every other bike sharing app in the world. So we'll talk about Gojek, but we'll talk about what it looks like in a market like Bangladesh, which is scarily, scarily, the more I think about this, scarily similar to many different African markets.
[00:01:23] Olumide Ogunsanwo: We're going to be talking about Pathao today. So high level info. So it's the largest mobility tech platform in Bangladesh. One of the largest tech companies in Bangladesh. They're not just a motorbike sharing platform. They do a bunch of different things. They have car ride sharing, which means they're a little bit similar to Uber and Bolt.