EMPG (formerly known as Zamzama Property Group) owns and operates bespoke property verticals in emerging markets, primarily in the Middle East and South Asia. The group’s flagship ventures are Bayut.com in the UAE, Zameen.com in Pakistan and Bproperty.com in Bangladesh.
RISE OF ALI KHAN BROTHERS
EMPG’s CEO Imran Ali Khan and his two brothers were born in Pakistan. They came to live in London when Imran was 15 years old. Imran’s first job was flipping quarter-pounders at the McDonald’s on west London’s Target Roundabout. The brothers did A-levels at Northolt High School. Imran then went up to Wadham College, Oxford, and his brother Zeeshan to Imperial.
Imran, who had interned at Goldman Sachs, started working after graduation in accountancy at Deloitte. But his brother wanted to try a start-up. Imran, who had more of a computer science background, helped his brother in the evenings with his first venture, a web portal for buying wholesale products which he describes as “like Alibaba, but internet 1.0”. Other start-ups followed. In a short time, there were ten different ventures going. And so the idea came up for a property portal in Pakistan — which was to become the country’s most successful tech start-up.
Zameen.com was founded in 2006 by Ali Khan Brothers. In 2012, Gilles Blanchard, co-founder of SeLoger.com — France’s largest property portal — came on board as an angel investor and took up the role of Chairman at Zameen.com. In 2014, two of the most successful venture capital firms in the ASEAN region, Catcha Group and Frontier Digital Ventures, invested in a non-controlling interest.
- In 2012, Zameen.com received an angel investment (undisclosed amount) from Gilles Blanchard
- In 2014, Zameen.com struck an investment deal for an undisclosed amount (Series A Funding) with Frontier Digital Ventures and Catcha Group.
- In 2015, EMPG raised $9 million from three renowned international funds in its Series B investment round. The investment went into Bayut’s holding company.
- In 2016, EMPG announced that it had raised another $20 million in its Series C venture round. The investment went into Bayut’s holding company for expansion in the Middle Eastern region.
- In 2017, Zameen.com took Pakistani real-estate market to Dubai by conducing its first-ever Expo in Dubai which was inaugurated by H.E. Sultan Butti Bin Mejren, Director General of Dubai Land Department.
- In 2018, Bayut.com secured $50m of investment as part of a funding round
- In 2018, Bayut’s owner EMPG acquired Morocco-based property website Mubawab for an undisclosed sum.
- In 2019, EMPG announced that it had successfully closed its Series D investment round, raising an additional $100 million by KCK Group including eight other investors making it the largest round of investment in the company’s history.
- In 2019, EMPG’s Bayut announced that it has acquired the GCC business of Rocket Internet/Middle Eastern Internet Group’s Lamudi in a landmark deal that will see Bayut take ownership of all Lamudi assets in the GCC, including its portals in Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the UAE.
- In 2019, Mubawab, Morocco’s leading real estate portal acquired by EMPG in 2018, has announced the acquisition of Jumia’s acclaimed property listings website Jumia House for the North African (specifically Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria) region.
EMPG currently employs a workforce of over 2,000 people across all its markets and receives close to 10 million visits on its websites every month, generating around 70 million page views and over 2 million customer inquiries in the same timeframe.
THIS IS NOT WHERE IT ALL ENDS….
Following the unprecedented success of EPMG’s Online Property Business, it was time for the group to move up the value chain and make further contributions to the real estate industry. Zameen Developments is born of this desire to address the gaps in the development and construction spheres, leveraging the trust of the Zameen brand built through 13 years of tireless service.
- In 2019, The development arm of Emerging Markets Property Group (EMPG), Zameen Development’s joint venture with ACE Group & MIH Group from UAE have started working on The 14-storey multipurpose building, ‘Zameen Ace Mall’, will be built on 20 kanals (10,000 square yards) on the main Sir Syed Boulevard of DHA Islamabad-Rawalpindi’s Phase II.
- In 2019, Announcement of “Zameen Opal” Development Programme in Lahore. It is located in Land Breeze Housing Society on Main Raiwind Road and is being built on 10 kanals (5,000 square yards) of land, featuring a total of 175 residential apartments.
THE TRIO BROTHERS
IMRAN ALI KHAN
CEO — EMPG
HAIDER ALI KHAN
CEO — BAYUT.COM
ZEESHAN ALI KHAN
CEO — Zameen.com
DID YOU KNOW?
In 2016, Zameen.com was hacked on the day of their biggest Property Expo in Pakistan. A Bangladeshi hacker named as Tiger Mate hacked and defaced one of Pakistan’s largest real estate websites Zameen.com and leaked the complete source code and its whole user database. The leaked database contained usernames, email address, md5 encrypted passwords, personal phone numbers and other related personal details of the registered users.
TITTLE-TATTLE TALKS — INSIDE STORY OR A RUMOUR?
Remember 2010 movie, “The Social Network”? and the Winklevoss Twins known for suing Zuckerberg, claiming the Facebook founder stole their idea for the social network platform when the trio attended Harvard. Similar story was reputed among Zameen.com’s team in Lahore circulating the “Inside Story” which corroborates that even before the inception of Zameen.com, a close friend to Ali Khan Brothers during a house party that took place in 2006 shared his idea of starting an online property portal which was filched by Ali Khan brothers who started working on Zameen.com and launched the project within a week. However, it is said their “friend” never pursued any statutory actions.
CONCLUSION
Not sure about the brilliantly crafted sign-off for their TVC “HAR PATA HUMEIN PATA HAI” but Ali Khan brothers certainly know their game of success and growth.
One of the best case studies I have had so far. There is so much to talk about their accomplishments!
I wish them more power and success!
The contents are extracted from Wikipedia, EPMG website and other available sources on the web. This is a generic case study not related to a research method.