“We invested $200,000 of our own money.” How a startup from Uzbekistan secured $12 million from a major bank
Rustam Khamdamov, Vadim Zakharyan and Dzhahongir Narzullaev from Tashkent were building careers in a telecom company when they saw the potential in developing an IT platform for retail stores. That’s when the colleagues launched the startup BILLZ. Today it has 5,000 clients across Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan. And this year, BILLZ closed a deal with the Georgian bank TBC: for $12 million, the startup sold a controlling stake and transitioned from a local player into part of a major banking ecosystem. As part of the joint Digital Business and Astana Hub project “100 Startup Stories of Central Asia,” Digital Business spoke with Rustam Khamdamov about launching the product and the early mistakes that cost the company time and money. He also shared why the team spent nights in retail stores, what features customers appreciate most, how a chance breakfast meeting led to a multimillion-dollar deal, and why the founders had no doubts about becoming part of a bank.
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