By Aitizaz Hassan ISLAMABAD, April 18 (INP-WealthPK): Four startups from Pakistan – Elphinstone, Mahaana Wealth, Rider, and Markaz – got investment for first time from Y Combinator in Winter 22 cohort (Dec 22, 2021 to March 21, 2022). Y Combinator is an American startup accelerator that has launched more than 3,000 companies including famous startups like Reddit, Airbnb, and Stripe. Y Combinator provides seed funding for startups. Seed funding is the earliest stage of venture funding. It pays startup expenses while a startup gets started. According to data released by Y Combinator, almost 400 startups from across the world have joined Winter 22 cohort. The accelerator investment of each startup reached up to $500,000 on two SAFE (simple agreement for future equity) notes. Y Combinator introduced the SAFE in late 2013, and since then, it has been used by almost all Y Combinator startups and countless non-YC startups as main instrument for early-stage fund-raising. Elphinstone is a Karachi-headquartered fintech company that claims to be building the 401k. 401k is a feature of a qualified profit-sharing plan that allows employees to contribute a portion of their wages to individual accounts. Elphinstone sponsors the retirement account in the US that employees can contribute to for Pakistan. It is founded by financial services and journalism professional Farooq Tirmizi. The startup had previously raised around $300,000 funding towards the end of 2020. It currently has the securities advisor license from the Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP). Mahaana Wealth of Islamabad is the second Pakistani fintech company in the Winter 22 cohort of Y Combinator and claims to be the “first and only licensed digital investment advisor” that can create its own retirement and exchange-traded funds. The startup was founded by Muhammad Shamoon Tariq, partner at a Swedish investment manager. Karachi’s Rider is a tech-enabled third-party logistics company serving the e-commerce market. It was founded in 2019 by Salman Allana, an ex-banker turned UPS (United Parcel Service) executive, and raised $2.3m in a seed round led by Global Founders Capital, Fatima Gobi Ventures, and Asian Development Bank. On its Y Combinator profile, the startup claims to do 200,000 orders a month and has a revenue of $130,000. Rider is developing modern parcel delivery for online sellers in Pakistan. Meanwhile, Markaz Technologies from Islamabad is building a reseller platform for micro-entrepreneurs in Pakistan. Markaz Technologies enables WhatsApp, Facebook, and Instagram-based micro-entrepreneurs to source wholesale products from across Pakistan. Markaz Technologies was founded in August 2021 by Umair Aslam, Sameel Hayat, and Shoaib Khan who bring in experience from EasyPaisa and JazzCash, among others. Similarly, the startup like Abhi, Udhaar app, Safepay, Tag, Byte, Tajir, Axis, and Genuity are already the partners of Y Combinator and also got the pre-seed and seed investment form it.