Lahore's almost-complete Software Park tower

After many delays and much hemming and hawing the much awaited Lahore Technology Park is almost complete. The building has now been topped off and work on the facade and interior has been moving forward full steam for a few months now. The parking lot structure, which will also contain some additional commercial space, is also pretty much done. Much remains to be done in the immediate vicinity though… vendors running small shops and stalls need to be moved, the power line distribution infrastructure needs to be re-worked, specially on the Ferozepur Road side, and the park grounds need to be beautified. But, in due time, that too will happen. For now, it’s nice to see the completed structure of a much delayed building!

It’s important to point out that with the delays affecting the CDGK’s (City District Government of Karachi) call center tower, this will be the country’s largest single structure devoted to technology – mostly software – businesses. The PITB (Punjab IT Board) is the agency responsible for the construction and maintenance of this complex.

Stay tuned for more as work progresses…

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A preliminary design shows Lahore's upcoming Times Square - 17 skyscrapers between 29 and 42 stories tall!

Let the good times roll! The KSE is rocketing north once more, foreign exchange remittances by Pakistanis abroad are hitting all time highs and property deals are happening left, right and center. The Pakistani economy is booming, baby!

I was thrilled to see a recent announcement by the much respected Defence Housing Authority, Lahore, concerning their partnering with the now-famous UAE based property development group, Hydra. They are embarking on a massive undertaking that will contribute positively to Lahore’s rapid development, and to jobs and economic opportunities in the city.

The two groups will be developing a nearly 50-acre commercial cum residential area with 17 high-rise office buildings from 29 to 42 stories tall, a 21-story five-star hotel, a massive mall and thousands of apartments. Parks, roads and a commercial area will round out the project.

“A central feature of Time Square will be a tree-lined retail avenue with food and beverage outlets and small bazaars. The joint-venture plans to build a luxury hotel complex with 600 rooms in the third phase and to add a seven-floor shopping mall in the final phase. Pal Group expects to pay for the project using its own funds and by pre-selling some of the units and borrowing from banks, he said.”

More on the Hydra Properties website.

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Emaar UAE's Pakistan subsidiary is building Crescent Bay in Karachi

There is little doubt in the fact that the UAE and Pakistani economies are increasingly inter-twined. On this very blog, we’ve talked about substantial UAE investments in Pakistan, in particular in real-estate, Banking and Telecommunications. And of course, in one of the most important new projects under construction in Pakistan, the $5BN Khalifa Refinery.

This, however, is the flip side of that story. Economic integration comes when you have a symbiotic relationship. And that’s where Pakistan and the UAE are headed. According to statistics published in The News today, Pakistanis have already invested Rs. 190BN in UAE real-estate, and over 6,000 Pakistani companies are now registered and operating in the United Arab Emirates. A few months ago, we alerted you to Netsol’s (a Pakistani software company) listing on the Dubai Stock Exchange. Looks like there will be a lot more of this happening in future!

Ponder over these numbers… they are substantial, to say the least. And they don’t even account for the hundreds of thousands of Pakistanis working in the UAE for local companies. In fact, remittances by Pakistanis in the the UAE have been on the increase and Pakistani exports to the UAE are over $2BN now.

With Dubai only an hour’s flight from Karachi (shorter than the flight to Lahore!), the UAE is geographically convenient and incredibly well connected. Pakistan is the answer to the UAE’s food security, manpower, technical expertise and defence requirements. The UAE provides Pakistani companies with an excellent international platform, it matches manpower with jobs and can act as a conduit, via its growing stature as a financial hub, to act as a conduit for investment into Pakistan. Stay tuned for more on this trend, but I think the UAE/Pakistan economies may develop so many synergies that, at some point, it may make sense for Pakistan to consider a GCC-like partnership with the UAE.

More from the horse’s mouth (The News):

Pakistanis invest Rs190bn in UAE real estate

DUBAI: Pakistani businessmen have invested about Rs190 billion or more than 8.7 billion dirhams in the real estate sector of United Arab Emirates (UAE).This was stated by the president of Pak UAE Business Council Dubai Iskandar Sultan while welcoming the visiting delegation of FPCCI here at a dinner on Friday.

Pakistani Ambassador in UAE Khursheed Junejo and leading Pakistani businessmen in the Emirates were also present on the occasion.

He said that Pakistan has become the top third investor in the UAE real estate sector.

He said that more than 6,000 Pakistani companies were operating in the Emirates and was greatly contributing to its booming economy.

Leader of the Pakistani delegation Dr Mirza Ikhtiar Baig on the occasion invited Pakistani companies to invest in Pakistan’s agriculture, dairy farming, energy, telecommunication sectors along with textile city and other projects that offer high return on investment.

Earlier, in the day, Pakistani delegation visited Sharjah Chamber of Commerce and Industry and invited investment from UAE businessmen in infrastructure, alternate energy and agriculture.

President Sharjah Chamber, Ahmed Mohammed Al-Midfa in his welcome address said that Pakistan can export more food items to Sharjah and UAE. There is also need for joint ventures in food processing between Pakistani and UAE companies, he added.

He said that Sharjah Chamber delegation can visit Karachi Chamber and discuss these joint ventures.

Dr. Baig pointed out that Pakistan offered investment opportunities to Sharjah based businessmen in corporate farming to produce dairy products, grain and feed for animals as well as fruits and vegetable for export to UAE and other gulf countries.

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A monstrous commercial building close to Liberty Market

I was recently in Lahore and I couldn’t help but notice the immense amount of commercial construction happening in the city. Just driving down the Gulberg Main Boulevard one can see numerous high rises being built. This process has been going on for the last many years and does not appear to be slowing down despite the global economic meltdown. I took just a few pictures from the window of a fast moving car, but I think you’ll get the point.

Exciting construction projects happening in Lahore right now include:

• The Ring Road
• Hyatt Hotel close to the Airport
• PITB’s Software Park Tower
• PACE Tower close to Sherpao Bridge (K Block)
• Sheikh Zayed Complex on Ferozpur Road
• Mughalpura Flyover (On the Canal)
• Numerous high rises on the Boulevard and M.M. Alam Road.

Click on any of the images below to see a larger version.

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This post is not about the latest infrastructure project in Pakistan, or the newest startup out of Lahore. I am not going to be talking about the usual things I focus on here at Tech Lahore. Today, for some strange reason, I feel an urge to go a little bit deeper than usual and share with you some musings on identity. My identity. What it is to me, what it does for me and why it is the most important thing I have.

To start off, I am incredibly lucky. I was born to a privileged family in Lahore, Pakistan. I attended the best schools around (Yes, a proud Aitchisonian!) and was exposed to people from all parts of the world at a very early age. More than anything else, my parents were focused on making sure their kids got the best of everything, including their own time. They always had time for us. My father would spend hours upon hours painstakingly explaining arcane concepts to me, narrating ancient history, telling us stories from the Quran or explaining mechanics, physics and mathematics for which I really had no formal grounding at that stage. But because I asked, he humoured me. And as he explained things to me, my fascination with the world around me grew.

My mother encouraged me to be as curious and creative as I wanted. Even in the days when the latest LEGO sets were hard to come by in Lahore, she would have a friend or an acquaintance somehow arrange to send my favourite pick from the catalog; even if it had to be shipped from London or New York! Yes, like I said, I was (and am) extremely lucky. My childhood was, in many ways, absolutely amazing because it was so comfortable, stimulating and love-filled that I really never even dreamt about wanting to be in someone else’s shoes. And it was this feeling - of NOT wanting to be in anyone else’s shoes - the sense that I would never ever want to change who I was or where I came from, that was the seed of a sense of self, and a sense of identity that I have built myself, and my life around.

Some of you might relate to what it was like growing up in Lahore in the early 80s. Your mind will probably be filled with pictures as you read the next few paragraphs. For the others, I hope I can provide enough to at least create a minimal context. I lived in Gulberg, which was one of the more established residential localities. A fair number of our relatives lived within walking distance of our house. I would go off to play with my cousins whenever I wanted to. There were no formalities like calling ahead, or checking to see if they had time. There was always a cricket game going on at our place or at a cousin’s. Or a softball game. Or four-corners, Carrom, Pithoo-garam, Badminton…

I often used to accompany my Grandmother during her weekly shopping trips. She had been shopping at the same department store since much before I was born. And it showed. We were given VIP treatment the moment we walked in. I remember, back in the mid 80s, Pepsi had launched a massive ad campaign starring Imran Khan. They had come out with an Imran T-shirt that was (obviously) in very high demand. This was, of course, before Imran chose to descend into politics. At that time he was still a much-loved cricketer. Anyway, I asked the department store folks if they could get me one of these Imran Khan T-shirts. We hadn’t been able to find them anywhere. They were all gone and no one knew when the next batch would be coming in. The store owner immediately dispatched two of his stock boys who eventually returned from their Mission Seemingly-Impossible with T-shirt in hand.

Whether it was the local auto mechanic, the department store owner, the bicycle puncture repair shop I frequented with my “BMX” in tow, the local soft-drink and Pan ‘khokha’ owner, or even the musician who would come by and sing qaseedas; they were all known to me. And it wasn’t just a sense of community - I don’t even know how to explain this - suffice to say, I really did NOT expect to ever run into anyone in the city of Lahore who would not have some connection back to my family or friends. That knowledge, of always being around people that knew me and my parents, meant that I really never had any reason to distrust or fear anyone. My default assumption was that people were friendly and good and wanted to help out in any way they could. And,  other than a few of my Neanderthal classmates(!), this was not far off the mark!

When I got to be a little older, around the time I was doing my O/A levels,  we were allowed to go out with friends on our own, without supervision. Many of my friends were allowed to drive solo . I was a little younger than most of my classmates and, while I was driving, I was not allowed quite yet to take the car off on my own. Of course, that was never a problem because my friends could, and did! My best friend at the time used to swing by our house almost every evening. We would usually kick the evening festivities off with a visit to the local market where we ate pan and drank Pepsi. Once this was done, we would then engage in a variety of ridiculous, inexplicable and what now seem like absolutely rogue, shameful escapades! For instance, one involved scrunching up our O’level class notes into little paper balls, cruising down an isolated, dimly lit street  that had maybe one or two pedestrians walking on it,  turning off our car’s headlights and letting the car cruise in neutral so no one would know we were there, and then, once we were right behind the luckless pedestrian, turning the lights on, revving the engine till it roared like an maniacal monster and chucking one of these paper balls at the poor soul. This act was typically accompanied by some very creative, incredibly loud, self-engineered sound effect. It was our version of shock and awe, years before GWB had stumbled upon the term! The first few seconds were usually priceless as most people who are struck with a tightly wound paper ball in a dark street react with a mix of shock, awkwardness and utter befuddlement. Once they realized what was going on and had gotten a grip on themselves, they would predictibly launch a verbal onslaught involving some of the choicest, juiciest and most creative Punjabi insults known to man. This last part - an exhibition of Lahore’s finely honed art of swearing - was probably more enjoyable than their initial confusion.

(Note to my readers: By the way, if any of you reading this were ever struck with a tightly wound paper ball while walking down a dark street in Lahore during the early 90s, I probably did it and I now offer my sincerest apologies. I’ll blame it on my adolescence and will happily send you a box of chocolates with a, ‘I’m frightfully sorry. I don’t know what came over me’ card, if you email me.)

Anyway, that was embarrassing enough to write about so I suppose I won’t be getting into the minute details of eggings, rikshaw-chukki and other novel sports we were indulging in back then. No one ever got hurt, and now that I think about it, it was probably because the most dangerous object used in any of these adventures was… an egg. Fun was had within limits and we never felt we had to cross them. Our guts were already hurting from the laughter that resulted from pranks of the “within limits” variety. There was really no question of us being able to handle anything more!

These limits weren’t just set by our parents or dictated by society, they were principally induced by our own minds and set by a commonly respected, unspoken code. All we wanted was a laugh (Ok, MANY laughs), but we cared enough about those around us to not really have any desire to hurt or cause harm to anyone at all. That this was the case is a profound realization for me today. Now that I think about it, this was probably because we had a very deep sense of ownership. Of Lahore and of Pakistan. I still do.

As most Lahoris who did their O/A levels in the ’80s or very early ’90s will tell you, the Os and As were the part of your life when you found yourself inevitably dumbstruck by the radiant, incalculable beauty and grace of your first love. Cambridge Univeristy may as well have added “Romance” as a required O’Level exam. You were going to have to pass or fail it at this stage anyway.

And when it came to being struck within an inch of death by your Helen of Troy’s thunderbolt, as such things usually go, it typically wasn’t planned. More often than not, it went something like this: Boy sees girl at English, Urdu or Math tuition. Sharam takes over and nothing is said. Boy starts listening to depressing Roxette love songs until his compadres have had bloody enough. At this point, the Boy’s buddy, who somehow knows the girl or one of her friends, delivers the “message” to her. The Girl then acts coy for several days (unless she has no interest, in which case the messenger delivers the bad news back to the Boy and all you get is more Roxette love songs). Ultimately, if things were meant to be, the Girl sends her phone number back to boy who then has a few windows during the day when he can call her at home. The conversation is completely innocent and involves setting up a rendezvous perhaps at some school play, or at a drama at the Alhamra Amphitheare (which had just been built back then).  The rendezvous, of course, meant several of her friends would be around, as would several of the guy’s buddies. They would all get to know each other and maybe have dinner together at Salt’n'Pepper, perhaps with an ice cream afterward at Yummy’s 36. The HIGH point of the year was the school carnival - whether at the Lahore Grammar, or the Convent - depending on where the object of your affection studied. This was the one legit place you could go meet with her and have a good time, typically around a bonfire!

And lest this might begin to sound stifling by today’s standards, trust me, it wasn’t! It was actually a character forming experience. You knew that when you were courting someone, you had to do so decently. And it really was a courtship, not a driveby hit-and-run! At the end of all of this, whether it worked out or not, everyone typically walked away with their respect in tact, and still respecting the object of their erstwhile affection. These seemingly quaint mannerisms and now-ancient-sounding practices are a part of my identity because this is what I thought was normal when I was growing up. This is the filter through which I look upon all that happens around me now. And the current state of affairs feels so awfully jarring at times, I don’t want to have much to do with it. It is as if the innocence and sweetness have been bartered away for an unparalleled crassness.

I can go on and on, and part of me wants to. Because I’m enjoying myself right now, reliving my childhood as I recount it for you. But I’ll get to the point lest I bore you to death! The point is this: All the experiences of my childhood, the love my parents gave me, the discipline that was inculcated in me by my Headmaster at Prep School, the kindness done to me by dozens of people - whether in going out of their way to get me an Imran Khan T-shirt, or giving me a super-extra-meetha-pan when I had paid only for the regular one - and the sense of pride I had in my family, my school, my city and my friends are the things that, today, define me as a person. They are concrete and they are strong. They remind me of who I am and where I come from. They are my shield when a frustrated immigration officer at a foreign airport looks accusingly at my green passport. I am proud of who I am and no amount of CNN and BBC stories telling me what Pakistan is “really like” will ever make any difference to my self-worth and self-respect. I only wish a few of these tasteless CNN/BBC hacks had experienced a childhood in Lahore, half as fulfilling as mine! Alas, they haven’t, and the loss is theirs. As for me, I take Lahore and Pakistan with me wherever I go. I carry the memories of my childhood in my heart, to be relived, one pleasant day at a time whenever the bitterness of the present compels me to do so.

As I said right at the beginning, I am incredibly lucky. My identity is, for me, an unending reservoir of hope and strength. It has armed me with contentment that will last a lifetime.

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News has reached us from Beijing that several Chinese companies are bidding for the Lahore Software Park project on a Built-Operate-Transfer basis. China has done a wonderful job in many of its own provinces by rapidly upgrading infrastructure and building out very impressive software parks and special IT and export zones. Making use of the skill and experience of these companies to augment the already underway IT infrastructure projects in Pakistan is a welcome step.

The DAWN carries the rest of the details.

BEIJING, Dec 19: China will participate in the bidding for Software Development Park in Lahore.

A Chinese delegation visited Pakistan to examine the setting up of Software Development Park on BoT basis and submitted its findings to the Ministry of Information and Industry (MII), China.

The Counsellor Technical Affairs at Pakistan Mission, Syed Ai Tallae also accompanying the Chinese delegation said after holding meetings with the Chinese side here, they were convinced to participate in the tender.

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The New Scientist published a story about LUMS‘ PMB (Poor Man’s Broadband) software. This is a peer to peer architecture that is designed to accelerate downloads. It works somewhat like BitTorrent and other P2P applications, but there are some fundamental differences as well. For one, it’s focused on dialup users. For another, it implements pre-fetching and a browser plugin. This article from TechPin has more technical details.

A short extract from the New Scientist story says the following:

Instead of using expensive broadband or slow, unreliable dial-up connections, students at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) will try out a new system, dubbed “poor man’s broadband” (PMB). It allows computers to link to each other directly for faster downloads, and it works as long as at least one computer running the trial software has already downloaded the desired file from the internet. The system should also reduce the university’s risk of overloading the bandwidth supplied by its internet service providers (ISPs). PMB is a mixture of peer-to-peer (P2P) software – touted as the internet’s future (New Scientist, 13 October, p 28) – and pre-internet techniques, whereby users dialled other computers directly to exchange files. It is based on …

The invention has its detractors, of course, including ALL the readers that posted at this forum. However, it also has its supporters, including Microsoft, which has decided to fund this research.

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I recently heard a rather shocking story involving a local software firm (which we will leave unnamed, for it is barely germane to the rest of the story) and one of its former employees. Apparently, said company was having some payment problems with a foreign customer. By all accounts, the foreign customer was being quite a pain and refusing to pay several months development fees without initially having contested them. The local firm was using undelivered work as leverage to get their money – pay us for our work or you won’t get the deliverable. Fairly normal till here. Happens all the time. Until we add the spicy, local dimension…. The foreign customer, sensing that they would have to pay to get the code, contacted one of the senior developers on the project and essentially asked him what the “alternatives” were to get their hands on the deliverable.

The developer, eager to make a quick buck, stole the latest version of the application and uploaded it to the customer from a private account, thereby eliminating all leverage the Pakistani software firm had to recover its money.

And it doesn’t end here. The developer then, keeping everything hush hush ofcourse, resigned from the software firm on apparently good terms (little did they know!!), got a good recommendation and went to work for another firm in town. A week into it, our poor victim firm realizes what has happened, and that too, by accident. While they are figuring out how best to tackle what for them is truly a crisis, the question for the wider industry is, how often does this sort of thing happen? And what can be done to prevent it and skin the scoundrels who do this sort of thing?

Another very similar story is that of a large orthodontics company based in Lahore catering to the US market (woe is you if you can’t guess the name!). Apparently they were in the middle of a patent related lawsuit with a competitor in the US. The US competitor simply “hired” one of the factory techs and “encouraged” him to say the needful in return for relocation to Dubai for him and his family, accompanied by a handsome payout.

What Thieves and Scoundrels! Stuff like this can kill a nascent industry, which the software industry is in Pakistan.

A while ago some software industry CEOs in Lahore were toying with the idea of maintaining an industry wide “reference check” database on current and ex-employees. I, for one, strongly feel that if someone does something remotely close to the above, they should not only be blacklisted from the industry but have severe criminal charges pressed against them. The famous “drawing room ki sair” at the hands of the Punjab Police does have its uses!

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