Email Marketing is not dead! Try Probaho, a homegrown ESP from Bangladesh ▶ Join Now

05 Startups That Failed In Bangladesh Last Year

We suppose this is not the right time to document failures. Especially, for a nascent startup ecosystem like Bangladesh. But then we thought, building something is hard and failure is not only a common outcome but a necessary one. Most successful founders have a history of multiple failures. It is not the success that breeds success rather it is our ability to endure failure and stand up every time we fall that takes us to the green pasture.

Failure is a commonly discussed theme within the startup ecosystem. Statistically, 9 out of 10 startups never make it to the finish line. Many of them just fold by the wayside and die silent deaths.

While the fear of failure is a very real thing, but the idea that“fail fast, fail often” is a valuable one. Building a business requires a lot of trails and errors and sticking to the idea of fail fast enables entrepreneurs to quickly test a particular market, fail, and learn valuable insights that they can use to build on.

People have been doing businesses in Bangladesh for ages but startup, as we call it now, is a comparatively new idea to this part of the world. The ecosystem, which means enabling environment, is nascent and will take time to mature. But in the last couple of years, we have seen quite a good progress.

This list looks back to few interesting startups that did not make it to the finish line. The purpose is not calling names of those who failed and humiliate them rather retrospect and encourage more people to try and fail. It is not failures that we regret most in life rather those chances that we don’t take.

One of the metrics we use at Future Startup in order to measure progress is the number of failed startups. It tells something very important about an ecosystem. It tells you that people are starting and trying. This list is our attempt to document the progress of our startup ecosystem.

[su_divider top="no" text=" " divider_color="#adacab" link_color="#edde29" size="1"][/su_divider]

Umbrii
Umbrii was a social media management startup aimed to help small businesses across the world to better manage their social media profiles and to provide a one stop solution for social media marketing to small and medium enterprises in the US and Canada.

Read Umbrii story here and here. 

[su_divider top="no" text=" " divider_color="#adacab" link_color="#edde29" size="1"][/su_divider]

The Tech school
The Tech School was a coding and electronics education institute for kids.

Read our take on TTS here and here.

[su_divider top="no" text=" " divider_color="#adacab" link_color="#edde29" size="1"][/su_divider]

Incogmito
Incogmito was an anonymous social networking platform that used to allow its users to share thoughts and ideas, make confessions, post problems, ask questions without giving off their identity-decided to shut down operations recently.

Read our take on Incogmitio here and here and here. 

[su_divider top="no" text=" " divider_color="#adacab" link_color="#edde29" size="1"][/su_divider]

Joldi
Joldi was a Dhaka City based on demand delivery service. The startup used to employ bicycle messengers to deliver goods within the Dhaka city.

Read our take on Joldi here and here. 

[su_divider top="no" text=" " divider_color="#adacab" link_color="#edde29" size="1"][/su_divider]

Online Kenakata
Online Kenakata was a marketplace based in Dhaka that used to allow merchants to sell products on its platform for commissions.

Mohammad Ruhul Kader is a Dhaka-based entrepreneur and writer. He founded Future Startup, a digital publication covering the startup and technology scene in Dhaka with an ambition to transform Bangladesh through entrepreneurship and innovation. He writes about internet business, strategy, technology, and society. He is the author of Rethinking Failure. His writings have been published in almost all major national dailies in Bangladesh including DT, FE, etc. Prior to FS, he worked for a local conglomerate where he helped start a social enterprise. Ruhul is a 2022 winner of Emergent Ventures, a fellowship and grant program from the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. He can be reached at [email protected]

In-depth business & tech coverage from Dhaka

Stories exclusively available at FS

About FS

Contact Us