TheJakartaPost
Please Update your browser
Your browser is out of date, and may not be compatible with our website. A list of the most popular web browsers can be found below.
Just click on the icons to get to the download page.
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Popular Reads
Top Results
No results found. Please check your search term and try again
Can't find what you're looking for?
View all search results
Global ambitions drive Algerian tech start-up Yassir
Despite the country's notoriously complex business climate, taxi and home-delivery firm Yassir has millions of users and is expanding across Africa.
Change text size
Gift Premium Articles
to Anyone
Share the best of The Jakarta Post with friends, family, or colleagues. As a subscriber, you can gift 3 to 5 articles each month that anyone can read—no subscription needed!
An employee prepares a basket of groceries at the storage department of the Algerian delivery company Yassir, in the capital Algiers on February 23, 2022. (AFP/Ryad Kramdi)
I
t's the Algerian start-up that made good: despite the country's notoriously complex business climate, taxi and home-delivery firm Yassir has millions of users and is expanding across Africa.
"We made it our mission to create a model of success that was genuinely, 100-percent Algerian, to develop local talent and show that it's possible to create added value in Algeria," said co-founder Noureddine Tayebi.
Patience has been key as they navigate the country's archaic bureaucracy, the bugbear of investors and one that creates particularly tough terrain for new entrants.
"Bureaucracy is one obstacle that we have to overcome. I can't say it's easy, but you have to deal with it and move forward," Tayebi told AFP.
It's a sign of changing times in Algeria, which in 2020 passed a law on start-ups and created a ministry to promote them.
Since he launched Yassir five years ago with fellow engineer Mehdi Yettou, the company has rolled out across the Maghreb region and beyond.
Late last year they raised some $30 million from American investors, cash they plan to pump into an ambitious expansion plan.
More from The Weekender
Jakarta’s padel moment
From FOMO to full-blown obsession, padel has captured the city. What comes next may depend less on courts and more on the communities that grow around them.
The battle over memory
And why the government’s plan to rewrite its history books should alarm us all.
Are younger workers getting something right about work?
As micro-retirements gain traction, Gen Z and young millennials are challenging traditional ideas of ambition, success and when it’s okay to pause.
