factories in Kot Lakhpat, Sundar Industrial Estate and a big 40 acre factory in Rahimyar Khan producing bakery products, processed milk, jams, marmalades and soft drinks. It is an enigma for the multinationals who have not been able to increase the rates of their beverage brands because of similar quality replacement by Gourmet.
While entrepreneurs were able to carve out a place in trade and industry, they have been unable to make significant impact in the knowledge economy. Here the geniuses usually do not have any resources.
They develop software and programmes that can make the services or products of better quality than available in the market and at a cheaper rate. These programmes or ideas are useless unless they are tested in the market.
For this they require finances that are not available in Pakistan. Venture capital is mostly unheard of in our society. The investor does have a stake in the idea but the risk is that the investment will only return with profit if the idea clicks, otherwise the investor must be prepared for total loss.
Most of the entrepreneurs idealised in Pakistan are from knowledge economy. Majority shareholders of Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Whatsapp and apple launched their companies without capital; some from their garages. However, through venture funding they are all now giants in the global economy.
Lately, some government universities, private sector educational institutions and some NGOs have established incubators for the knowledge economy start ups. For instance Arfa Kareem University of Information Technology holds hand of 30-32 start ups through a merit-based selection system. In five years, they provided 160 startups with training, arranged peer to peer meetings with globally renowned IT experts for them, and gave all secretariat facilities and some remuneration for the startups for six months.
According to their spokesman the success rate has been above global average and those 160 startups that came with no resources, have cumulative assets over $700 million (Rs70 billion). In fact, they sent 22 percent most brilliant of these startups to Austin United States at the request of Austin mayor.
Through their presentations to entrepreneurs in Austin, 60 percent of them were able to get venture capital that was elusive in Pakistan. Now an Austin-based investor has opened a $20 million venture capital fund for Pakistani startups only.
Similar efforts by universities like LUMS, Lahore School of Economics, and Aga Khan University are facilitating startups in knowledge economy, but they all lack the kind of funds to launch them according to their potential in the global economy.