Comments on: Pakistan’s most startup friendly cities

By: ahmed

ahmed — Tue, 03 Mar 2009 18:13:43 +0000

Karachi,anytime for anything,the most cosmopolitan and most business friendly.why do they have all the major banks and multinational based in karachi.the city all has the advantage of being a seaport,close to the energy corridor and above all more connected with the world,both physically and mentaly.crime always get better.lahore and islamabad are asdangerous now as karachi,plus they are provencial

By: Malik

Malik — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 21:01:23 +0000

There are so many place in Pakistani which must be visited, if you are looking for peace of mind that Hunza, Maree, Nathia Gali, Kura Karam and the best Jheel Saif-al-Maluk…

See the preview here, how beautiful place this is, http://www.pakreel.com/view/1176/pakistan-adventure-hunza-valley/

By: farzal

farzal — Fri, 14 Nov 2008 06:12:21 +0000

for some reason I thought this article would attract a lot more debate – data points such as #graduates per year in each city/territory, market saturation, experience pool, access to mentors and finance, access to customers, etc.

By: Qazi

Qazi — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 08:28:18 +0000

though we are in islamabad, i still think that in my personal opinion Lahore is a better place to start but then again i have not done it there so some body from lahore would be a better person to comment on it

By: ujmi

ujmi — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 07:45:44 +0000

I guess, I will prefer Islamabad or Lahore anytime for my next startup.

About security issues in Islamabad, you don’t have to be in Red-Zone to be starting that business (and actually not many startups can ever afford to be there!).

In Islamabad, one should look towards, E/F/G-11 sectors, or I-10/9/8 sectors…are strategic, and with lower expenses. “I” sectors come with a benefit of being right in the middle of Islamabad and Rawalpindi so a startup can attract relatively affordable employees from Rawalpindi that way.

Another advantage for Islamabadi startups can be if they take a look at graduates coming from NWFP. These people are often very hardworking, even sometimes with MSC degrees they have no practical experience. So they might have read all but would most probably not even know how to set attributes in .net environment. If you can risk 2 months, hire them as Internee, put them under an experienced senior programmer and then you can have them ready to work as Junior programmers for several months (possibly an year, until you can retain them later). With them you can save money and get good hardworking coders (I am sorry it is indeed exploitation but it works good for both sides and much better than those graduates from institutes of Islamabad who often are just looking for a higher pay, but an office job which requires only talk).

*Just few things based on my few years of entrepreneurship -