Meet the fast-growing Go-Jek of Bangladesh

Dhaka traffic. Photo credit: joiseyshowaa.

Dhaka, Bangladesh’s capital, is an insanely densely populated city.

Growing up here, Elius Hussain says, one thing is always on your mind. The traffic. The horrible jams. How you have to sometimes wait for hours before you can even get on a bus to go home.

“You say Jakarta is bad. You’ve not been to Dhaka.”

Regardless of which city makes for the more catastrophic commute, it’s obvious that mobility is an issue in Bangladesh’s capital.

How to beat the traffic

Pathao, the startup Elius runs, transports goods and people on two wheels – to beat traffic. It’s basically the Go-Jek of Bangladesh, and it’s growing fast, making thousands of trips a day after launching in 2015.

Ferrying people on motorcycle taxis wasn’t the plan from the start. Pathao was born in 2015 as a delivery service. Its fleet of motorcycle drivers and bike messengers bring parcels to clients in Dhaka and beyond. The service thrives on the back of the growing demand for reliable ecommerce deliveries in Bangladesh. Pathao works with Rocket Internet’s Daraz, among others.

Pathao’s story screams for a comparison with Go-Jek.

But, in mid 2016, Pathao decided to introduce on-demand motorcycle rides.

It’s just like the service we’re already familiar with from Go-Jek, Grab, or UberMoto. You launch a request on the app, hop on the back seat of a two-wheeler, and get dropped at your destination for a fixed price. It’s faster and more convenient than the experience of riding in one of Dhaka’s auto-rickshaws or manual rickshaws.

A Pathao bike rider with passenger. Photo credit: Pathao.

Learning from Indonesia

Pathao’s story screams for a comparison with Go-Jek – now a unicorn startup in Indonesia. It started out with a similar trajectory.

Back in 2010, Go-Jek had a small fleet of motorcycle drivers who did ecommerce deliveries within Jakarta. Go-Jek also offered bikes for personal transportation. Customers ordered in advance through a call center.

The logistics business is also growing

Quick rise