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Google has announced its support for the largest online shopping festival in Pakistan, dubbed ‘Tech Mela’, the online shopping event will be the first of its kind in the country’s emerging e-commerce market.

Tech Mela is slated to run for a duration of 10 days, starting on September 11 and will end on September 20.

“Pakistan’s mobile industry is really taking off with more and more people coming online and using their smartphones as their primary Internet device,” said Tania Aidrus, Country Manager South Asia Frontier at Google.

“It is absolutely the right time to hold this virtual shopping festival just before the traditional holiday and festive period of Eidul Azha and what better way than to hold it completely online where the next wave of buyers will be congregating,” added Tania.

With Internet penetration growing rapidly and the desire to purchase on the Internet increasing, we hope this initiative will bring more awareness and adoption of e-commerce in Pakistan, stated Google’s country manager.

According to TNS Research, there are 30 million online users in Pakistan, half of whom are using mobile phones for the purpose. Google is teaming up with e-commerce partner Daraz.pk, the Dawn Media Group as its media partner and Activ8 as the development partner to hold the online shopping festival.

“The majority of digital consumers in Pakistan are already researching online to decide which device to purchase, and for the most part they find online resources more relevant and credible to their purchase journey,” stated Tania.

According to Google’s top executive in the country, the Tech Mela is an initiative to complete the research and purchase loop, and to spur greater acceptance of e-commerce among even more Pakistanis.

Tech Mela will focus on exclusives, special deals and attractive discounts on smartphones, gadgets, data and voice plans that will only be available online during the duration of this event.

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