It’s a great time for start-ups to be raising funds, says Yashish Dahiya, co-founder and group chief executive of insurance aggregator Policybazaar.
“If entrepreneurs have identified a problem to solve, even though they are not fully clear about how they will do it, it’s a good time to try to attempt it,” he said at the TiE Global Summit for entrepreneurs in Dubai on Wednesday.
“Entrepreneurship is a much better option than being in status quo in a large company. With the kind of change we are witnessing now, it’s hard to decide whether big companies are more stable than start-ups,” he added.
Entrepreneurship is a much better option than being in status quo in a large company
Yashish Dahiya,
co-founder and group chief executive of Policybazaar
PB Fintech, the operator of Policybazaar, raised about 57 billion rupees ($761 million) in an initial public offering in November this year.
Policybazaar, founded by Mr Dahiya in 2008, pioneered comparison shopping in life, health, auto, travel and property insurance in India. The online insurance marketplace, backed by SoftBank’s Vision Fund and Tencent, among others, raised $75m to fuel its expansion in the UAE and the Middle East in March of this year.
Sharing his tips for success in the entrepreneurial space, Mr Dahiya said: “Always be on time — never early or late, have depth in your team/management, build a family culture at work and do not have an option to give up.”
He also advised entrepreneurs who are looking to raise funds to be patient.
“Don’t expect every person you meet to believe your story. An investor cannot commit funds to everybody. Keep trying.”
However, Mr Dahiya said he worried whether parts of his team would turn complacent and lackadaisical. Sometimes you think you have won when the race is not over, he said.
“Once you are past the struggling phase, you emerge a different person overcoming your fears and you can look at the future differently,” the chief executive added.
Asked what drives him every morning, Mr Dahiya said: “Very few people have an opportunity to make an impact. That possibility is what drives me.”
Talking about the disrupters to watch for, he said the role of technology is passé in every market segment and this is the age of data.
“You need to leverage data to create a differentiating factor. Consumers tell insurance companies so much about themselves. Since we are data-rich, it’s fairly straightforward to analyse that data,” Policybazaar’s chief executive said.
The insurance aggregator plans to house its tech and data analytics businesses in the UAE — where it has been operating for the past four years — and use it as a hub “because the ease of doing business here is very good”, Mr Dahiya said.
“We want to help other insurance players to leverage this data. That’s how we plan to go international.”
There is a deep need for insurance in India, unlike Europe, where social security is already very strong, he said.
Providing that type of aspirational social security will not be realistically possible for the government in a country as vast as India in a meaningful time frame of 10 to 15 years, Mr Dahiya added.
“Consumers’ engagement with insurance is very low. That is reflected in the lower penetration levels and not-so-great products being sold,” he said.
“Since consumers spend a lot of money on insurance, they would do well to research it a bit more and buy products that really add value to them. The campaigns we have been running for the past 13 to 14 years are geared towards increasing consumer awareness and encouraging them to buy the right product after doing extensive research.”
Policybazaar is growing “like we were when we were a baby company”, the founder said. The insurance aggregator accounts for about 10 per cent of health insurance business in India and about 25 to 30 per cent of life insurance business, he added.
“Our health insurance market share is probably growing at 3 per cent to 4 per cent every year,” Mr Dahiya said.
The specs: 2018 Kia Picanto
Price: From Dh39,500
Engine: 1.2L inline four-cylinder
Transmission: Four-speed auto
Power: 86hp @ 6,000rpm
Torque: 122Nm @ 4,000rpm
Fuel economy, combined: 6.0L / 100km
Groom and Two Brides
Director: Elie Semaan
Starring: Abdullah Boushehri, Laila Abdallah, Lulwa Almulla
Rating: 3/5
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Other acts on the Jazz Garden bill
Sharrie Williams
The American singer is hugely respected in blues circles due to her passionate vocals and songwriting. Born and raised in Michigan, Williams began recording and touring as a teenage gospel singer. Her career took off with the blues band The Wiseguys. Such was the acclaim of their live shows that they toured throughout Europe and in Africa. As a solo artist, Williams has also collaborated with the likes of the late Dizzy Gillespie, Van Morrison and Mavis Staples.
Lin Rountree
An accomplished smooth jazz artist who blends his chilled approach with R‘n’B. Trained at the Duke Ellington School of the Arts in Washington, DC, Rountree formed his own band in 2004. He has also recorded with the likes of Kem, Dwele and Conya Doss. He comes to Dubai on the back of his new single Pass The Groove, from his forthcoming 2018 album Stronger Still, which may follow his five previous solo albums in cracking the top 10 of the US jazz charts.
Anita Williams
Dubai-based singer Anita Williams will open the night with a set of covers and swing, jazz and blues standards that made her an in-demand singer across the emirate. The Irish singer has been performing in Dubai since 2008 at venues such as MusicHall and Voda Bar. Her Jazz Garden appearance is career highlight as she will use the event to perform the original song Big Blue Eyes, the single from her debut solo album, due for release soon.
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
Who was Alfred Nobel?
The Nobel Prize was created by wealthy Swedish chemist and entrepreneur Alfred Nobel.
- In his will he dictated that the bulk of his estate should be used to fund "prizes to those who, during the preceding year, have conferred the greatest benefit to humankind".
- Nobel is best known as the inventor of dynamite, but also wrote poetry and drama and could speak Russian, French, English and German by the age of 17. The five original prize categories reflect the interests closest to his heart.
- Nobel died in 1896 but it took until 1901, following a legal battle over his will, before the first prizes were awarded.
Ordinary Virtues: Moral Order in a Divided World by Michael Ignatieff
Harvard University Press
Company Profile
Name: JustClean
Based: Kuwait with offices in other GCC countries
Launch year: 2016
Number of employees: 130
Sector: online laundry service
Funding: $12.9m from Kuwait-based Faith Capital Holding
Ten tax points to be aware of in 2026
1. Domestic VAT refund amendments: request your refund within five years
If a business does not apply for the refund on time, they lose their credit.
2. E-invoicing in the UAE
Businesses should continue preparing for the implementation of e-invoicing in the UAE, with 2026 a preparation and transition period ahead of phased mandatory adoption.
3. More tax audits
Tax authorities are increasingly using data already available across multiple filings to identify audit risks.
4. More beneficial VAT and excise tax penalty regime
Tax disputes are expected to become more frequent and more structured, with clearer administrative objection and appeal processes. The UAE has adopted a new penalty regime for VAT and excise disputes, which now mirrors the penalty regime for corporate tax.
5. Greater emphasis on statutory audit
There is a greater need for the accuracy of financial statements. The International Financial Reporting Standards standards need to be strictly adhered to and, as a result, the quality of the audits will need to increase.
6. Further transfer pricing enforcement
Transfer pricing enforcement, which refers to the practice of establishing prices for internal transactions between related entities, is expected to broaden in scope. The UAE will shortly open the possibility to negotiate advance pricing agreements, or essentially rulings for transfer pricing purposes.
7. Limited time periods for audits
Recent amendments also introduce a default five-year limitation period for tax audits and assessments, subject to specific statutory exceptions. While the standard audit and assessment period is five years, this may be extended to up to 15 years in cases involving fraud or tax evasion.
8. Pillar 2 implementation
Many multinational groups will begin to feel the practical effect of the Domestic Minimum Top-Up Tax (DMTT), the UAE's implementation of the OECD’s global minimum tax under Pillar 2. While the rules apply for financial years starting on or after January 1, 2025, it is 2026 that marks the transition to an operational phase.
9. Reduced compliance obligations for imported goods and services
Businesses that apply the reverse-charge mechanism for VAT purposes in the UAE may benefit from reduced compliance obligations.
10. Substance and CbC reporting focus
Tax authorities are expected to continue strengthening the enforcement of economic substance and Country-by-Country (CbC) reporting frameworks. In the UAE, these regimes are increasingly being used as risk-assessment tools, providing tax authorities with a comprehensive view of multinational groups’ global footprints and enabling them to assess whether profits are aligned with real economic activity.
Contributed by Thomas Vanhee and Hend Rashwan, Aurifer
The Settlers
Director: Louis Theroux
Starring: Daniella Weiss, Ari Abramowitz
Rating: 5/5
WHAT ARE NFTs?
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are tokens that represent ownership of unique items. They allow the tokenisation of things such as art, collectibles and even real estate.
An NFT can have only one official owner at one time. And since they're minted and secured on the Ethereum blockchain, no one can modify the record of ownership, not even copy-paste it into a new one.
This means NFTs are not interchangeable and cannot be exchanged with other items. In contrast, fungible items, such as fiat currencies, can be exchanged because their value defines them rather than their unique properties.
Dubai works towards better air quality by 2021
Dubai is on a mission to record good air quality for 90 per cent of the year – up from 86 per cent annually today – by 2021.
The municipality plans to have seven mobile air-monitoring stations by 2020 to capture more accurate data in hourly and daily trends of pollution.
These will be on the Palm Jumeirah, Al Qusais, Muhaisnah, Rashidiyah, Al Wasl, Al Quoz and Dubai Investment Park.
“It will allow real-time responding for emergency cases,” said Khaldoon Al Daraji, first environment safety officer at the municipality.
“We’re in a good position except for the cases that are out of our hands, such as sandstorms.
“Sandstorms are our main concern because the UAE is just a receiver.
“The hotspots are Iran, Saudi Arabia and southern Iraq, but we’re working hard with the region to reduce the cycle of sandstorm generation.”
Mr Al Daraji said monitoring as it stood covered 47 per cent of Dubai.
There are 12 fixed stations in the emirate, but Dubai also receives information from monitors belonging to other entities.
“There are 25 stations in total,” Mr Al Daraji said.
“We added new technology and equipment used for the first time for the detection of heavy metals.
“A hundred parameters can be detected but we want to expand it to make sure that the data captured can allow a baseline study in some areas to ensure they are well positioned.”
What can victims do?
Always use only regulated platforms
Stop all transactions and communication on suspicion
Save all evidence (screenshots, chat logs, transaction IDs)
Report to local authorities
Warn others to prevent further harm
Courtesy: Crystal Intelligence
From Zero
Artist: Linkin Park
Label: Warner Records
Number of tracks: 11
Rating: 4/5
Company%20profile
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