An Interview with Nasser Khan Ghazi

Nasser Khan Ghazi can easily be called a pioneer of the Internet in Pakistan. He founded Digicom, Pakistan's first Internet Service Provider, in 1994, and brought the Internet to Pakistan in 1995, sparking the data communications movement and revolutionizing the way Pakistanis communicated with the rest of the world. Here, he talks about the heady early days of the company, the challenges he faced, the controversy surrounding his exit from the company in 1997, and his plans for the future.


Tell us about life before Digicom.

I was born in Madras, India in August 1965. I am a Yusufzai Pathan and many generations of my family have lived in Central India.

Our migration to the South began when my father became the second Muslim in India to be selected - through the open competitive examination - to the 1953 batch of the Indian Administrative Service (IAS) - the equivalent of the CSP in Pakistan.
My childhood years were typical of the culture of the Civil Service of the subcontinent - our family lives revolved around it. My father was an extremely successful member of the Service and was in fact, at the age of 38, the youngest person to be appointed Home Secretary to the government of Tamil Nadu. His premature death in 1977, at the age of 46, changed our lives dramatically.
My childhood memories are a mix of memories of the civil service days and, from my mother's side, of poignant and tantalizing memories of the fading era of Muslim rule in India. We are a very close family and I have relied extraordinarily on the strength of my mother and brother, Saeed Ghazi, without whose constant affection, support and confidence, I would surely not have met with any success at all.
I was privileged to attend one of the best schools in the country - Don Bosco. I passed my Matriculation Examination in 1980 and was placed tenth in the state of Tamil Nadu. I completed my Higher Secondary education in 1982 and was placed twenty-first in the state of Tamil Nadu. I chose a career in engineering and graduated with a B.E in Computer Engineering and Science from the College of Engineering, Madras in June 1986. I left India permanently for the US in 1986 and graduated with an MS in Computer Science from Virginia Tech.
I worked for Western Geophysical, Houston, TX from 1989 to 1993 and was one of the leaders in the development of a state-of-the-art seismic processing system.
In 1992, I was married to Erum, in Karachi and our daughter Saarah was born in Karachi in 1993. Erum made huge sacrifices and she and her family provided strong support to me as I spent 14-18 hour days establishing Digicom.


What made you think that the Internet would succeed in Pakistan?

When I came to Pakistan I wanted to establish sophisticated software development capabilities in the country, set up a sophisticated and secure means of communication, and provide Pakistan with a "media" voice in the fast emerging electronic media world which we refer to today as the "Webtone". I also wanted to establish a sophisticated means of oil exploration - a field where I had considerable experience and good contacts with the OGDC from my days in Houston.
For any of this to succeed, we needed an electronic means of communication within the country. E-mail was in its infancy and was being very poorly run, while there was no concept of high-speed leased data lines. E-mail and Internet services would also help finance the software development projects that were my principal goal.
I ran some pilot tests on last-mile and asynchronous communication capabilities and found that Pakistan had excellent copper and state-of-the-art digital telephone exchanges. It was clear that we could support high-speed modem communications at 14,400 Kbps or higher (the highest speeds available in mid-1993).
I also found that raw talent was plentiful for the tasks that I had in mind. Engineers in Pakistan were as good as anyone anywhere - they would require careful management and direction to deliver. I worried, of course, about the average engineer and still think that the low quality here is a major stumbling block in our progress.
I was convinced that the WWW would be quickly and readily accepted in Pakistan as it represented a means of acquiring knowledge that was free from the linear book form. It was well suited to the culture of Pakistan, as here we read not for pleasure but to obtain the information we need.


What were the hurdles you faced in starting the company?
We had to first sort out the objectives of the company. My intention was to establish a sophisticated software development company that would work on a variety of key technologies, including the development of Web infrastructure, and would keep itself financially viable through earnings from e-mail, Internet and data communication services. This was our first hurdle.
The second source of frustration was the enormously cumbersome process of registering a Private Limited company in Pakistan. The Articles of Association in Pakistan are a sound example of a colonial vestige - we use pages and pages to describe what businesses the company will engage in. When incorporating in the US, a single line that states that "the company will engage in any business that is legal in the US" usually suffices. The fees are also quite heavy and CLA reform here would be a big help. Outside the banking, insurance, healthcare and a few other sensitive industries it shouldn't take more than four or five sheets of paperwork.
Eventually I had to settle for a pure data communications company and although in the end it worked out fine, I realize that I had some very strong software talent that I was unable to utilize for real development. This was a source of great regret for me.


Did you find that people were generally aware of what the Internet was or did you have to build awareness as part of your business strategy?

Building awareness was a huge part of the business strategy. I realized that I needed to convince two ends of the spectrum - the trading community on the one side, and the more sophisticated multinational corporations on the other. The bureaucrats from the civil services would be easier to convince as I came from the same background and know them to be far smarter than most people think!
I faced a negative mindset at different levels but overcame it through seminars, exhibitions, advertisements, and by evangelizing the concept of instant, low-cost communications. It took me more than a year to break this mindset, but even with the preliminary dial-up e-mail service, we had started to make good headway. The constant exposure that the Internet received on worldwide television helped to fortify what we were campaigning for tremendously.
My general acceptance in science and technology circles served as a constant and huge morale booster and helped to re-affirm to people at various levels the importance of what we were doing. The exposure and encouragement that I received from my inner circle of friends like Dr. Altamash Kamal, Mr. Samir Hoodbhoy, Dr. Manzoor Ahmed, Mr. Moeen Malik and, later, Professor Atta-ur-Rahman was invaluable. My friendship with Prof. Atta-ur-Rahman - who is surely the rarest of the rare jewels of Pakistan - was one of the joys of my stay here. I was constantly amazed at his enormous creative energy.
When the National Bank of Pakistan, through the visionary efforts of the Senior Vice President Mumtaz Saeed, placed an order for over 300 e-mail accounts with us to link most branches of the NBP, I knew that there would be no turning back for us. Shortly thereafter we were able to secure a large account from PIA as well.


Tell us about the launch of the service.

We had to race against the government machinery and that I had to get the Internet in place while there was no law against it! At the same time, many of us were actively involved in lobbying the government to allow the private sector to provide international data up-links - Dr. Shahid Mir and Dr. Altamash Kamal were key players here. At that point in time, the government had licensed 5 or 6 companies to provide domestic data communication services.
However, the drafted license had a crucial loophole that did not clearly state that the PTC would have exclusive rights over international data uplinks. We worked with Pak DataCom, a semi-government corporation, and were able to work the loophole in the license to get permission to establish international data links in the private sector.
Eventually we had to establish the international leased data circuit from Karachi to Singapore by ourselves. This was a significant personal achievement for me and I was proud of the engineers in Digicom who helped accomplish this - in particular Iftikhar Waheed, Aamir Mahmood Khan and Nasir Habib. It was not an easy task to set up a circuit without any real prior experience with satellite communications.
The final turn in the screw required a trip to Singapore as we were experiencing clock-slips. When I got this straightened out at the Singapore end and sent the first ping via leased satellite-based circuit to my server nelofer.erum.com.pk in Pakistan, the Internet was born - on July 16, 1995.
I then decided to launch full-scale services immediately. This was a calculated risk as I was not sure if the newly formed Pakistan Telecom Authority (PTA) would strike us down since the international data circuit was outside PTC's domain. However I felt that the wave of popular support for the Internet would help establish the concept firmly.
I also fought a huge internal battle with the investors and leased a large 30-foot Trivision at the new Quaid-e-Azam International Airport to give Digicom and the fledgling Internet in Pakistan the correct exposure. This was to ensure that the Internet would not be subjected to any stringent government controls. I think all of these paid off and the government was equally wise to allow the private sector to continue to offer Internet services.
We were fighting a second race as well - I wanted Digicom to be the first ISP in Pakistan and wanted Pakistan to be the first South Asian country to offer Internet services. Both objectives were achieved - within Pakistan we were way ahead of the PTC and COMSATS. The former Prime Minister Mohtarma Benazir Bhutto had specifically tasked the latter to establish Internet services. We were also several weeks ahead of India's Government controlled-VSNL, which announced Internet Services for the first time in India on August 15, 1995 - four weeks after Digicom launched its Internet services.
The PTA was fortunate to have far-sighted General Hamid Hussain Butt overseeing it and a highly constructive DNOPS (Data Network Operators Association) headed by Dr. Altamash Kamal advising the PTA (in addition to Mr. Moeen Malik). The PTA immediately instituted a license for private sector Internet Service Providers in Pakistan. In contrast, to this day the government-controlled VSNL in India continues to control the Internet and the privatization process in India continues to face problems.
I must also record Mr. Jamshed Masood's efforts as the Deputy Director for licensing at the PTA. He was largely responsible for the speed and high degree of fairness in the licensing process.


What were some of the misconceptions about Internet that you faced from the authorities?

The principal element behind the confusion was the lack of exposure to complex analysis of the media itself. Few individuals had read or even heard of Marshall McLuhan's thesis on the media and the enormous underlying complexity of the implications of new media.
The security apparatus of the country were still coming to grips with it too. I spoke at several seminars, including an important one organized by the Department of International Relations at the University of Karachi on the security concerns of the country vis-a-vis the new technological developments. Over the months, I think I managed to put the point across - albeit at great personal stress - that the Internet should not be tampered with in the country. The point was by and large well taken.
The efforts by the DNOPS were also significant in clearing misconceptions at the government level.
As a company, we were overseen through a rigorous discipline with a view to prevent the misuse of the Internet. While this put me in an extremely stressful situation on a daily basis, I was happy and relieved to see this process through and complied with it as it was and would always be in the national interest - and there is no doubt whatsoever that every single country engages in this sort of regulation.
Some experiences were quite humorous. Several months after our launch, we received a letter from a local division of the PTC asking us to shut down our Internet telephone lines as we had violated the law and were operating a PCO (Public Call Office). I politely informed the official that we had zero outgoing calls and could therefore not be a PCO. Undeterred, we received a letter a few days later stating that action would be taken against us since we were "like" a PCO!


What was the response of customers to the Internet finally becoming available?

The reaction amongst those that had a good concept of the Internet and yearned for it was euphoric. It took us nearly a year to build a customer base of 300 users with a dial-up e-mail service. The number of Internet users grew from 0 to over 1000 within the first two months of the launch.
I had hazarded a guess that people would learn the intricate details of Telnet, FTP, WAIS, IRC and the Web by themselves for the most part, and I was extremely happy to be proven right. A population that can absorb high-tech devices is a vital ingredient for progress. The lag in overall scientific development suggests a lack of individual empowerment and process problems rather than a lack of potential in people.
But our clients comprised the upper class of Pakistan to a very large extent. In some ways I was disappointed that one of my dreams - that of setting up e-mail kiosks at every street corner with ordinary citizens being able to communicate in the local languages - had materialized in the form of an additional service to the privileged few.
The official response was also highly encouraging. The PTA was extremely supportive of our efforts. However, I think the privatization efforts of the PTC became an unnecessary stumbling block. The PTC struck back and insisted on monopolistic rights on international data uplinks and has introduced unnecessary taxation on basic services. It has not planned for growth in this sector with respect to last-mile and international data circuit requirements. The biggest blow to the data communications and software industry in Pakistan is the repeated and inexplicable failure to sign on to the submarine fiber optic links.
On the other hand, the OIC's COMSTECH, under the guidance of Prof. Atta-ur-Rahman, made huge efforts and made all the correct strategic moves to expand our role in this sector in the context of the OIC. The former president of Pakistan, Sardar Farooq Leghari, displayed top-quality understanding and leadership to help Pakistan become a strong player in the datacom sector. Unfortunately, I was unable to make any further contributions to these efforts after I left Pakistan and I regret this greatly.



Why did you leave the company?

At this point, I have relinquished day-to-day operational control of the company. However, I do have over $400,000 invested in the company and have not yet sold my shares in Digicom to anyone.
In May 1997, I had just completed a small-scale expansion by adding an additional 128 Kbps circuit. We then became the first multi-homed ISP in the country. However, I had perceived that an expansion to a 2 Mbps or at least a 1 Mbps circuit was required in order to maintain market share and to compete with the likes of CyberNet and other new entrants in the game. Our overall customer satisfaction was also beginning to drop significantly, as we did not have enough bandwidth.
I made numerous efforts and fought long and hard to make progress with the other shareholders on positioning the company so that we could obtain finances for the larger expansion. I had made all the necessary political moves to get the required bandwidth. But the other shareholders simply rejected all efforts to get additional finances for the company on the grounds that their share would be diluted - and they refused to invest any further and refused to allow me or any third party to invest any further. They also rejected the idea of taking Digicom public.
I then started to explore the possibility of an outright sale of the company. I argued in favor of doing so as I felt it would serve the interests of our customers better for a management team with stronger financial resources to take over. Here again (and I discovered this much later), the other shareholders played a duplicitous role and rejected several good offers without adequate reasons.
I was simultaneously looking for other means to guarantee the long-term survival of the company and decided to implement a new project in the US which could have helped generate the finances for the large-scale expansion. With this in mind, I left for the US in May 1997 and was all set to work on the new project - which would have either helped us implement the larger expansion or facilitated a sale of the company. However, shortly after my arrival in the US, the other shareholders decided to cancel this project and began to pressurize me into surrendering my stake in Digicom.
With no possibility of making any forward progress with the company, I decided, sometime in June 1997, that it would be best to relinquish operational control of the company. I informed the other shareholders of this decision and asked them to conduct the transfer of control through a written agreement.


After you left, there was a huge dispute within Digicom upper hierarchy and it resulted in operations being suspended for a good ten days. What happened?

Sometime during the second week of July, I had lost all access to the systems. By then I had conveyed my decision to relinquish day-to-day operational responsibilities.
I had no access to reliable information in Digicom after the last week of July and do not know exactly what actions the new management took. The e-mail correspondence that I received from my senior managers indicates one or more of the following: The shareholders hired some outside consultants to work on the systems. The systems administrator, allegedly, showed up at work late one night in an intoxicated state.
There was some sort of conflict between the systems administrator and the new general manager. In his e-mail message to me, the former labeled the latter a "Moulvi" and was upset and suspicious of him on account of this. There seemed to be a tussle for system passwords between the two.
The downtime was puzzling since Digicom had a complete set of backup tapes that I had personally made and handed over to the administrators before embarking for the US project in May 1997. Moreover the systems administration policies that I had put in place were stringent and required the administrator to make daily and weekly backup tapes. I had established a backup policy that allowed us to restore all systems from scratch in a matter of a few hours.


What did you learn from the experience of starting Digicom?
Well, I learnt a great deal from the Digicom experience - to establish a successful company is one thing. But to create a market where one did not exist allows you the luxury of being able to think about many, many challenging and interesting situations.
I spent every moment thinking strategically and I had many hard problems to deal with - personnel, investors, the market, regulation, government interests, military interests, national security, national prestige. I learnt immensely about marketing, sales, support and service delivery, data communications with scarce resources, last-mile problems and their solutions in the context of Pakistan.
Fortunately I had come fresh from the US with a strong exposure to a very high-pressure development project (where I worked on building a state-of-the-art seismic processing system which comprised over 2 million lines of code). I was able to apply a great deal of what I had already learnt there.


What are you working on currently?
I am currently a manager in the Enterprise Customer Unit of Microsoft Corporation. I manage engineers who support Microsoft's Exchange Server for our Premier Enterprise Customers. I am excited and proud to be a part of the intense battle that Microsoft is fighting to win the Enterprise.


Do you plan to return to Pakistan anytime soon?
Although I am a US Citizen, Pakistan is dear to my heart - I do plan to return to Pakistan as soon as I am in a stronger position, individually, to make more contributions to its progress and development. I continue to have great dreams about what I would hope to achieve when I do return to complete unfulfilled ambitions.