By Ariba Shahid
KARACHI, PAKISTAN (Reuters) – Alibaba Group subsidiary, Daraz Group, an e-commerce platform, is reducing its workforce by 11% to prepare for the ‘current market reality’, the group’s CEO Bjarke Mikkelsen said in a letter to employees shared on the company website.
Mikkelsen cited a difficult market environment, with a war in Europe, huge supply chain disruptions, soaring inflation, increasing taxes, and removal of essential government subsidies in its markets. The group operates in Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal.
Daraz, Pakistan’s largest e-commerce retail platform, was founded in 2012 in Pakistan and acquired by Chinese giant Alibaba in 2018. It has 100,000 SMEs in Pakistan on its platform.
Daraz said in 2021 that it had access to 500 million customers with a team of 10,000 employees. It has invested $100 million in Pakistan and Bangladesh over the last two years.
(Reporting by Ariba Shahid; Editing by Kim Coghill)
