The SeedRise KP Fund, a blended finance early stage startup investment initiative hosted by IMSciences Peshawar and supported by The Asia Foundation, held its Pre-Launch Event on September 5, 2026, at IMSciences. The event drew more than 300 participants, including investors, financial institutions, government representatives, incubators, universities, ecosystem organisations, development partners, and startups from across Pakistan, a turnout that signals substantial early interest in a fund specifically designed to address Khyber Pakhtunkhwa’s comparatively underserved startup investment landscape relative to Pakistan’s more established hubs in Karachi, Lahore, and Islamabad.
The event marked a significant milestone with the unveiling of SeedRise’s legal and institutional structure, giving stakeholders clarity on how the blended finance vehicle will actually operate rather than remaining a conceptual proposal. Alongside this, organizers released the KP Startup Ecosystem Scoping Study, a piece of groundwork that matters considerably for a region where structured, current data on startup activity has historically been thinner than in Pakistan’s major metropolitan ecosystems, making evidence based fund design considerably harder without it. The event also unveiled an initial pipeline of 75 investment-ready startups, a figure that gives the fund a concrete starting point for deployment rather than launching with capital and no clear sense of where it might go.
A keynote address was delivered by Kabeer Naqvi, entrepreneur in residence at Abhi Group, whose presence connected the launch to one of Pakistan’s more established fintech and microfinance groups. During the event, institutional memoranda of understanding were signed with Abhi Microfinance Bank Limited and LMKT Private Limited, agreements intended to strengthen investment, capacity building, technical assistance, and broader ecosystem collaboration. Abhi Microfinance Bank’s involvement in particular points toward blended finance structures that may combine commercial capital with development-oriented support, a model suited to a region where purely commercial venture capital has been slower to establish a consistent presence, while LMKT’s participation draws on its existing role operating National Incubation Center Karachi and other Ignite funded programs elsewhere in the country.
A panel discussion featuring leading stakeholders explored the opportunities and challenges involved in building a stronger and more inclusive startup ecosystem in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a conversation that carries particular weight given the region’s distinct security, infrastructure, and market access considerations compared with Pakistan’s larger urban centers. IMSciences Peshawar, which already operates two incubation programs of its own, including IM Durshal in partnership with the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Information Technology Board, provides an established institutional base for SeedRise to build from as it moves from this pre-launch stage toward active investment.
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