Concerned with the traffic problem in his hometown, Hussain M Elius made a small solution. With five of his friends as the riders, Elius founded Pathao in 2013. He was inspired by Go-Jek, which later become one of its’ key investors. The company raised $12.8 million in its latest funding and now it’s valued at $100 million.
The number 5 for Pathao
After just starting with five motorcycles, Elius soon found out that the demand for a motorcycle taxi is big. It is due to the non-existent fixed rides available in Dhaka, Bangladesh. The motorcycle taxi that’s cheap and fast soon became popular.
Within 5 years since its’ founding, Pathao had grown to four different cities across Bangladesh. The app has been downloaded for more than 5 million times. And it listed 5 million drivers available for the customers.
Settled in his country, Elius started to look over the neighbor countries. He then realized that Kathmandu is a prospective city. As it has more motorcycles than in Dhaka. Pathao then opened its’ first international branch as Pathao Nepal in Kathmandu.
Still, more needs to be done
However the company still needs to grow bigger to followGo’s path. It has to deal with the regulation in the country. Because online ride hailing is still new to Bangladesh and Nepal, there are a lot of adjustments needed to be made on the regulation.
Cashless payment system is also still far from the more established ride hailing apps. The system is still too unfamiliar for the people of Bangladesh and Nepal. Most of the customers prefer paying in cash.
Pataho needs to think smarter to make it available, as it has bigger dream than just become a ride hailing apps. Elias admitted he wanted to make Pathao a lifestyle app that is used daily for majority of the people in the country. He also wanted to make it a super app in Bangladesh and expand even boarder to other countries with different languages.
