Rewiring B2B finance in Pakistan and beyond

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Hi friends! 👋

In Pakistan, nearly 70% of GDP flows through business transactions still governed by cheques, manual reconciliation, and siloed systems. At the same time, 40% of the economy remains informal, credit penetration is below 8%, and tax-to-GDP sits under 10%.

That’s where Omer bin Ahsan saw an opening.

After years inside Pakistan’s Federal Board of Revenue, he understood firsthand why banks weren’t lending: no data, no compliance, no visibility. So in 2017 he set out to solve that – not with loans, but with infrastructure.

Omer’s company, Haball, launched with a B2B payments layer for large corporates like Coca-Cola and Unilever. From there, it evolved into a deeply embedded, Shariah-compliant supply chain finance platform — built not on theoretical credit models, but on real payment behaviour.

Today, Haball is the engine behind Pakistan’s largest digital supply chain finance programme. And fresh off a headline-grabbing $52M pre-Series A — including $5M in equity led by Zayn VC and $47M in strategic financing from Meezan Bank, the country’s largest Islamic bank — the company is now setting its sights on Saudi Arabia and the GCC, armed with a capital-efficient playbook forged in one of the world’s toughest markets.

In this conversation, Omer and I unpack what it means to build in a market where volatility isn’t a risk – it’s a cyclical certainty, why going top-down beats direct-to-MSME, and how you build real moats in enterprise fintech — not with UX, but with trust, switching friction, and time.

We also explore why Haball’s approach to Islamic finance isn’t cosmetic — it’s contractual. And what it takes to embed those principles from day one.

Here’s what we covered:

• 🏦 Why B2B payments, not lending, was the smartest starting point in an informal economy

• 🧾 How ERP integrations created a low-CAC, high-retention wedge into 8,000+ MSMEs

• 🤝 Why Haball’s capital-light strategy outlasted well-funded competitors in Pakistan

• 📚 What “Shariah-first” actually looks like in contract design, pricing, and penalties

• 🚀 Why Saudi is the real test of embedded finance — and why Haball is building local, not exporting playbooks

Let’s get into it 👇

Actionable insights 🧠 🛠️

If you're short on time, here's what the smartest operators, investors, and founders should understand from Omer Ahsan's Haball playbook.

Premium members get the full version of this article, plus a TLDR summary with key takeaways and actionable insights right here.

Okay, let’s dig into it 👇

I’d love to start with the core thesis. Haball operates at the intersection of SME enablement, shariah-compliant finance, and B2B payments infrastructure. What’s the root problem you’re solving — and what made you confident that supply chain financing was the right entry point?

I think it really stems from my background. Before founding Haball, I was working with Pakistan’s Federal Board of Revenue. And one of the biggest challenges that any developing economy faces is the size of its informal sector. In our case, nearly 40% of GDP is informal. The tax-to-GDP ratio is horribly low — under 10%. And the volume of cash in circulation is one of the highest in the region.

Credit becomes a natural casualty in an informal economy. Formal financial institutions can’t lend to businesses that don’t leave a reliable data trail. That’s why lending penetration has historically remained below 8% — and now, it’s even less. So when you work with the federal government, you begin to see how the economy actually functions, and these systemic gaps become painfully visible.

I was working on a project that allowed citizens to pay taxes online — and that’s where I learned the mechanics of enabling digital payments.

So Haball didn’t originally launch with financing as the focus?

Not at all. We started as a payments company. At the time, we felt the biggest elephant in the room was B2B commerce — nearly 70% of GDP — still running entirely on cash and cheques. That space was long overdue for disruption.

But here’s the thing: even though the digital infrastructure existed, most fintechs and banks were focused on consumer payments. Nobody was seriously looking at B2B. There was this misconception that MSMEs wouldn’t adopt digital tools — that they were tax-averse, financially illiterate, and wouldn't understand how to use the tech. All myths.

We took a top-down approach. We started by integrating with the ERPs of large corporates — Coca-Cola, Unilever, LU Biscuits. Their distributors could then access our platform to generate invoices, place orders, and make digital payments across 35 banks in Pakistan — via internet, mobile banking, or even at the branch, for those without online access.

That changed everything. The corporate backing accelerated adoption. And COVID helped too — it was a forcing function for digital shift.

So, we were sitting on this treasure trove of payment data — MSMEs interacting directly with their suppliers, who were our customers. Colgate-Palmolive, Unilever, Coca-Cola, Pepsi — these companies were using Haball to issue invoices and receive payments. Because we were moving their invoices and payments, we didn’t need to ask for their version of the truth. The data was already there. And we realised — this is data that can be financed.

So when did financing come into the picture?

It was still early. We were just beginning to understand this opportunity — and that’s when the State Bank of Pakistan approached us. They said, "Why don’t we fund this as a grant? You already have the digital rails in place. You’re sitting on a real ecosystem. Why not layer financing on top?"

The remainder of this interview is for members.

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