Iran | How constraints breed innovation

Emerging Markets Startups

With 88M people, Iran’s startup ecosystem is one of the best examples of “constraints breed innovation.” Politically, sanctions have limited Iran’s participation in the global economy including limiting the use of everyday products like the Apple and Google Play store. With limited foreign influence, the usual competition that local tech companies face from the Ubers, and Amazons of the world are non-existent, enabling home grown tech companies to thrive. It’s also forced Iran to build most tech products from scratch including their own app store called CafeBazaar.
Although these constraints have been hard on people, it has forced Iranian entrepreneurs to be especially resilient and “hacky” to work around the sanctions and the government. We have Neda Golshan, who is the VP of Product at DigiKala, Iran’s largest ecommerce tech company. In this episode, Neda shares stories of Iranian entrepreneurs who’ve hacked their way to success.

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