Pakistan-based mobility startup BusCaro has crossed 20 million bookings for its bus-hailing commute service.
Founded in 2022, BusCaro partners with companies, schools and institutions through B2B and B2B2C models to provide daily transport for employees and students.
The service was created to address the country’s shortage of safe, reliable and affordable commuting options – an issue that disproportionately affects women and children who now account for 70% of BusCaro’s ridership.
“Safety is a humongous issue when it comes to transportation in Pakistan,” Founder and CEO of BusCaro Maha Shahzad told Zag Daily. “If you look at any survey of women interviewed after using public transportation, you’ll find that close to 100% report sexual harassment. That’s the intensity of how bad it is.”
Alongside widespread safety concerns, public transport availability remains severely limited – insufficient, Maha notes, to serve even half the country. Fewer than 10% of Pakistanis own cars, leaving most commuters with few dependable options.
“What we wanted was a safe, affordable way for women to commute. For men to commute. For children to commute. We launched BusCaro to do just that.”
Today, BusCaro processes around 40,000 bookings per day while maintaining over 99% on-time reliability. Since its launch, the company reports zero safety incidents.
Its routes are dedicated to specific partner organisations and supported by a proprietary technology stack offering live tracking, financial oversight for businesses, operational monitoring and safety features.
BusCaro’s Finance Director Umair Peerani told Zag that the company’s rapid growth is driven by “strong unit economics from day one” and consistent high utilisation. Trust has also been a major factor, Peerani added, making BusCaro a “first priority” for women and parents and encouraging the company’s institutional clients to scale their transport volumes.
Other growth drivers include a strategic focus on major educational institutions, continuous improvements to route optimisation and what Peerani describes as a “disciplined” approach to operational cost management. BusCaro now serves more than 80 corporate clients across Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and Rawalpindi.
The 20-million-booking milestone comes months after the company raised $2 million to expand its service across the nation, bringing total funding to $3.5 million.
BusCaro says it’s nearing profitability, with an EBITDA currently at –2%, several core routes already profitable and margins improving as utilisation increases. The company forecasts annualised revenue of $8.6 million by the end of 2025.
