Infobip Startup Tribe is a very helpful program for any startup that wants to spread its field of operation without breaking the budget. The free product credits we received made it super easy for us to focus on product development, rather than having to deal with the costs and negotiating prices. It really helped us with operating and testing everything on a big scale (in Morocco) without the need to spend money.
Maroun Bassam Maroun, Head of R&D, HAAT Delivery
The startup
Meet HAAT Delivery, a ground-breaking startup and the star of our story.
Founded in 2020 and currently numbering more than 100 employees and 1000 couriers working in 20+ regions in the Middle East, HAAT is on a mission to make food delivery universally accessible by focusing on “infrastructure-less” cities.
“Infrastructure-less” cities are the ones that either don’t have street addresses or ways to handle credit card payments, with restaurants that don’t have smart point of sales aka have no way to accept orders over Internet.
Driven by their appetite for solving complex logistical challenges, HAAT took on this challenge and developed a platform that is specifically designed to cater to these types of cities, with implemented solutions to address issues such as cash payments, point of sale, and locations without standard street addresses – by developing their own algorithm for tracking, they get to map and re-map locations they work in.
Their end-to-end food delivery platform is a suite of AI-powered mobile and web applications that work together so that restaurants and couriers can provide enjoyable food delivery experiences while expanding their businesses in ways that were not previously possible. HAAT makes nearby restaurants and their menus discoverable to anyone with a smartphone, plans optimized delivery routes for the couriers, uses smartphone location information when addresses are not available, and provides a secure and reliable framework for POS cash payments.
In short, they provide the restaurants with everything needed in order to make them available on the HAAT platform, and then make it accessible to everyone who wants to order food.
The origin
The idea for the service was born out of need. Dr. Hasan Abasi, CEO & Co-founder of HAAT, returned to his hometown of Umm-al-Fahm after working for Google and Intel in Europe, and found it near impossible to order food.
Dr. Hasan Abasi, CEO & Co-founder, HAAT Delivery
Something that was natural for him suddenly turned into a hard task and an overcomplicated process. In order to get food he had to call different stakeholders (from restaurants and delivery services, to drivers) and coordinate everything himself (telling the delivery where to pick up what, leading the driver to the right house by using “which-one-of-my-neighbours-do-you-know” navigation etc.). Realizing this a real pain point for him, he decided to solve this issue, and thus HAAT was born.
After piloting HAAT in a place where he lived, dr. Hasan Abasi noticed that he wasn’t the only one experiencing this problem, that almost all people who live in periphery shared it. So, with a vision of democratizing food delivery, HAAT started spreading its field of operation to over 20 regions in three countries (Israel, Palestine, Morocco), raising over $8M seed money in the process.
They are also currently in the process of expanding to other services like markets and pharmacies, making it an all-encompassing delivery platform in the future.
The Tribe
As a startup that is constantly improving (everyone in the company orders food through their app, feeding themselves while testing the product) and is looking to expand in more countries, HAAT was on a lookout for a reliable and affordable communication solution provider with a strong presence in the MENA region, and found it in Infobip through the Infobip Startup Tribe program.
After spreading their operations to Morocco they wanted an alternative SMS provider (for OTPs) to cut costs. By applying to the Infobip Startup Tribe program they secured a grant of, now totalling over $40,000 in product credits for Infobip product and solutions, and used it to raise their operation in Morocco to a higher level.
We have a great experience from the product itself in terms of SLA availability, but more importantly from the customer support. Every time we needed something, sometimes in matter of minutes if things were really urgent, we received an outstanding support.
We are also really satisfied with the performance of the platform itself, the dashboards are easy to use and the analytics help us raise our security through platform’s fraud detection.
Maroun Bassam Maroun, Head of R&D, HAAT Delivery
HAAT Delivery, R&D team
The takeaway
Using Infobip free product credits to spread and strengthen their operations in another country (Morocco), helped HAAT take a big step in their long term-goal of reaching everyone no matter where are they from. As long as people order food and there are restaurants, they will go there – that’s their rule.
Their efforts are already yielding more positive effects than anticipated: by employing young people as couriers or customer support representatives, they are helping them build better futures, stay in their hometowns and spend money there, making it a better place, one food delivery at a time.
In conclusion, HAAT wants everyone to have their basic needs met by being able to order food (and other goods) in an easy manner while strengthening local economies and providing good job opportunities. And we are happy to help them achieve that.🤘
Interested in joining the Infobip Startup Tribe?
