Dastgyr: the kiryana app that raised a record and then had to shrink

Dastgyr means helper in Urdu, and the pitch was that simple. A kiryana store owner in Karachi or Lahore opens an Android app, orders flour, oil and soap from a list of more than 2,000 products, and a Dastgyr van turns up the next day. The company handled the money between buyer and seller and, from 2021, lent shopkeepers the cost of their order.

Launching when nobody else would

The founders, Muhammad Owais Qureshi and Zohaib Ali, were LUMS friends from the early team at Airlift, the Lahore bus startup. They started Dastgyr in May 2020 with $300,000 of their own money, running the first supply operation out of a founder's living room, ProPakistani reported in July 2021. By August 2020 the company said it had hit 133 percent of projected sales in its first 90 days and raised a six figure angel round.

Customers came fast because the model ran on discounts and credit. In July 2021 a $3.5 million seed round led by SOSV, with ADB Ventures, Seedstars and Edgebrook Partners, took total funding to about $4 million. Dawn reported a team of roughly 280, about 30,000 customers and gross merchandise value up seven fold since the September 2020 launch.

“Pakistan is seeing the same patterns as India five years ago and China 10 years ago.”

The $37 million round

On 14 June 2022 Dastgyr announced a $37 million Series A, described across the Pakistani and international press as the largest Series A a Pakistani startup had raised. VEON Ventures, the venture arm of Jazz's parent company, led with $15 million and took a minority stake. Zinal Growth, DEG, Khwarizmi Ventures, Oman Technology Fund and Cedar Mundi joined, along with existing backers SOSV and Edgebrook. Profit reported that the round had been targeted at $31 million, that $25 million was equity and the rest a convertible note, and that total announced funding passed $41 million.

The company said it had added more than 42,000 retailers across five cities and would open 15 new regions in Pakistan and a first overseas market within the year, while moving beyond groceries into cement and steel. Profit noted that Dastgyr shared no documents confirming the amount, and that a marketing executive's claim of over 100,000 retailers could not be reconciled with earlier announcements.

When the shops stopped ordering

The money met the worst inflation Pakistan had seen in decades, and retailers ordered less and paid later. Rivals felt it first: Jugnu collapsed, Retailo cut engineering staff, and Profit reported in February 2024 that Bazaar too was struggling. On 18 January 2024 Profit reported that Dastgyr had let go nearly all of its warehouse staff and then about half of its white collar staff, a 50 to 60 percent cut to a workforce of more than 500 according to an employee. We Talk Startups put the cut at 80 percent and Profit later wrote 85 percent. Qureshi's email to staff blamed the global and local political and financial climate. Profit called the company on the verge of collapse, and a TechJuice retrospective in late 2025 filed it under survival mode.

Going global with a smaller team

Dastgyr did not die. On 23 August 2024, marking its fourth anniversary, the company said on its blog that it had gone global, with sellers in Kenya, Brazil and China serving buyers in North America, Europe and Asia. Its website today describes a global B2B marketplace across consumer goods, textiles, construction materials and electronics, with receivables financing of up to 90 percent of invoice value and offices in Karachi, Lahore and Islamabad.

No new funding has been announced since June 2022, and this magazine found no 2025 or 2026 reporting on revenue or headcount. Ali is listed as chief executive by two investors and by a 2025 television funding show. Dastgyr is a quieter company than the one that promised a unicorn, still trading, and still the holder of a Series A record no Pakistani startup has beaten.