Pakistans digital ledger startup, CreditBook, raised $11 million in pre-Series A funding.

CreditBook, a digital ledger and fintech startup based in Pakistan, has raised $11 million in pre-Series A funding.

CreditBook will be able to expand its team and provide more accessible financing to entrepreneurs as a result of the investment. The startup was founded to improve the financial outcomes of small businesses in Pakistan.

Starting with a simple digital ledger, the company has developed secure software that allows millions of businesses to easily manage their credit, sales, and spending cycles.

Businesses and vendors may download the CreditBook mobile app to digitize ledgers, manage on the move, and reconcile their accounts automatically, with the assurance that their data will be kept safe, secure, and backed up. The app also assists customers in scheduling and sending free payment reminders to help them avoid bad debts.

In an interview with TechCrunch, Iman Jamall, co-founder of CreditBook, said, “We started the study and began experimenting in late 2019.” “At the time, I was working as a service designer on a project for one of Pakistan’s top banks, and I was analyzing different persona types to attempt to figure out why financial services hadn’t taken off in the nation.”

Cash flow, the role of credit and the social interactions that surround it, and the over-reliance on “paper for everything essentially,” were the challenges we identified, said Jamall – Founder.

Merchants in various South Asian and Southeast Asian markets confront challenges such as an over-reliance on paper to keep track of the ledger and a persistent lack of cash flow. As previously stated, many of these small businesses operate on ad hoc credit, relying on the proceeds from the sale of current inventory to fund the acquisition of new inventory. Customers frequently shop for weeks, if not months, before settling their accounts.

These flaws are affecting small businesses and mom-and-pop shops, preventing them from growing at a time when major e-commerce behemoths are courting customers.

Merchants may now use CreditBook’s bookkeeping software to digitize the handwritten ledgers they’ve used in the past to keep track of their daily finances.

According to the startup, retailers in over 400 towns and cities have downloaded the eponymous smartphone app. CreditBook wouldn’t say how many merchants use the service, but it did say that the number of transactional users had climbed by tenfold since last year.

CreditBook’s main product right now is digital bookkeeping, but the company is also developing and testing financial solutions on top of it. It’s too early to say exactly how much financial products will look, according to Jamall.

Jamall provided some background on the areas CreditBook is looking into. “Payments in Pakistan have a lot of room for improvement. “However, mobile money has begun to gain traction, particularly in the wake of the epidemic,” she said, adding that the local regulator has made a push in recent years to expedite the adoption of mobile payments and is working on the development of an instant payments infrastructure.

This is a huge opportunity. According to the startup, there is a $45 billion funding shortfall for small enterprises in Pakistan, home to over 220 million people, 60% of whom are under the age of 30.

“We’re thrilled to join with CreditBook and make Tiger Global’s first investment in Pakistan; the investment is a testament to the team’s strong traction and vision,” said John Curtius, a Tiger Global Partner.

Image Credit: CreditBook