It is easier to grow your startup when you have a vast amount of capital, right? Or is it a well-hidden disadvantage?
Prominent Dubai businessman and billionaire Mohamed Alabbar teamed up with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) to launch a $1bn e-commerce platform Noon.com. And what was assumed to become the biggest e-commerce portal in the Middle East so far has had more downs than ups.
With a rumored 400 million already wasted, including millions spent on 50+ international consultants to assist in the technology space, advocated a highly complex technology stack and ultimately delivered nothing.
Noon’s recent endeavor was to acquire JadoPado and resulted in seeing the first product professionals working on Noon’s original front end being relieved of their responsibilities and replaced with JadoPado’s front end. The former founder and chairman of JadoPado Mr. Omer Kassim appointed as the new CTO of Noon.com. Unfortunately, that was short-lived, and Omer Kassim stepped down from his new role in under a month.
Despite a capital of $1bn Noon.com still had its fair share of problems, problems that maybe, could have been avoided if not for the attitude that throwing more money at a problem fixes it.