Pivotal Moments | Bilal Shabandri

Using his engineering background, Bilal Shabandri helped scale and sell his father’s business by transitioning to an e-commerce space. From there, he continued with his own entrepreneurial endeavors. With his colleague, Bilal competed in a variety of hack-a-thons and pitching competitions, while also interning at different startup companies. They both suffered major transportation difficulties, whether it was an over-crowded subway station, or a transportation desert. Five minutes before pitching a business idea, Bilal and his colleague decided to change courses and pitch an idea to solve transportation problems in UAE. The two co-founders won third place and decided to start arcab, a transportation service to bridge the gap between expensive private transit and cheap but crowded public transit through the utilization of premium vans. In 2020, Bilal piched arcab at the 2020 GSEA Finals and became a GSEA Global Finalist. Bilal speaks about shifting his strategy during the Covid-19 Pandemic, navigating startup business learning curves, creating a consistent outreach plan and the power of working with a team.