Daraz might not be known to many worldwide, but it is one of the biggest, if not the biggest, e-commerce stores in Pakistan and has a presence in Middle Eastern countries. Regarding Daraz, its story is similar to India’s Flipkart concerning its funding from a top player in the other country. While Walmart backs Flipkart, Daraz is backed by Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba.
As we know by now, almost everyone related to e-commerce and technology has announced layoffs, and next in line is Daraz. The company has just announced that it is also forced to lay off its workforce, and Daraz says that 11% of its workforce will be cut down. Daraz Group CEO Bjarke Mikkelsen wrote to their employees that they need to cut 11% of their workforce due to the “current market reality” in a letter seen by eCommerceNext.
Daraz Group, which operates in Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka, said that they are seeing increased taxes, soaring inflation, and war in Europe to be a difficult market environment, which is why they have to cut their workforce. Daraz was founded in Pakistan in 2012, and it was operating in the country before its acquisition by Alibaba in 2018 which saw it as an opportunity to enter the Pakistani market.
In 2021, Daraz reported having access to 500 million customers in Pakistan, with 10,000 employees working for them. While the official number is not yet announced, it seems as if the layoff will affect almost 1100 of their employees. While we know that the most prominent e-commerce players like Walmart and Amazon have also announced layoffs, the situation with Daraz in Pakistan is different because the country is going through an economic crisis right now.
It is said that they are on the verge of a collapse if China does not come to the rescue. Pakistan’s economic situation is so bad that it is almost on the brink of defaulting on its loans which are said to be in millions of dollars. If the situation does not improve in the coming months, the economic crisis in the country will deepen even more. Currently, Pakistan is looking for a bailout loan from the IMF.