Barely a year after its launch, the Malik Riaz-backed digital news venture, Nukta, has laid off 37 members from its Pakistan team.
According to sources, the layoffs took place because Nukta’s sponsors wanted to cut costs in an effort to patch up some of the losses they have been making. Nukta was officially launched in November 2024 with its headquarters in Dubai. The platform bills itself as a digital media platform and began operations with an extensive team of professional journalists picked from media houses across the country.
Before its launch, Nukta recruited aggressively and spoke to some of the biggest names in Pakistan’s news media. The head of the organisation is senior journalist Kamran Khan. In Pakistan, they had started the hiring process as early as December 2023. Many journalists were in talks with Nukta, although some backed out when rumours emerged that the main investor behind the platform was real estate developer Malik Riaz.
Malik Riaz has long been interested in acquiring a media organization in Pakistan. The trend of real estate developers acquiring media organizations has seen a rise in recent years, with one of the more significant transactions being Aleem Khan’s purchase of the Samaa Group. The idea has been that acquiring some form of news media gives the owner a mouthpiece.
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Back in 2023, Malik Riaz had been in talks to buy the Express Media Group as well. Reports from the time suggested that a formal agreement was even reached between the parties, but the deal was ultimately blocked by government agencies. At the time, Anwar Kakar’s caretaker cabinet was in power and the transaction did not receive the necessary security clearance for the transfer of the broadcast license and the deal fell through.
Following this setback, Riaz invested in launching Nukta, a digital-only news platform that promised a new model for journalism in the region. The business model of Nukta was based on revenue from platforms like YouTube and other online advertising income. However, with no subscription system and a very large team, the idea was that Bahria Town’s financial support would be able to sustain Nukta while it made a space for itself in Pakistan’s media landscape.
Some journalists were told Nukta’s investors had guaranteed they had the appetite to invest in it without any returns for two to three years. Backed by what was assumed to be the bottomless financial support of the Bahria Town owner, the platform began operations from Dubai and Pakistan. However, the launch coincided with financial woes for Malik Riaz. The real estate tycoon’s Pakistani assets were seized by the state. With outstanding fines of billions of rupees, Malik Riaz’s troubles have only grown.
In a major development in September 2024, the Pakistani government initiated the process of seizing 1,500 kanals of his property in Lahore’s upscale Bahria Town, valued at approximately Rs 1.5 billion, to recover a Rs 125 billion fine imposed by the Supreme Court. In separate cases, various assets of the real-estate tycoon have been seized, or auctioned to amplify political pressure on Malik Riaz, whose whereabouts are publicly unknown.
In its recent social media announcement, Nukta stated that the reduction of 37 members of its Pakistan workforce is due to a “recent restructuring,” calling it a “difficult decision” necessary for the company’s “long-term sustainability and vision.” The post expressed gratitude to the impacted colleagues, whose “creativity and contributions have been an integral part of our whole story.”
These actions signaled a severe liquidity crunch for the business magnate, directly impacting his ability to fund new ventures like Nukta.
On the other hand, in a swift response to the crisis for the media workers, Federal Minister for Information and Broadcasting Attaullah Tarar announced that the Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication (MOITT) would provide jobs to all 37 laid-off employees. The minister stated that the government stands with the journalists and media workers, ensuring their livelihoods are protected.
Nukta was launched with ambitious goals of creating impactful digital media platforms from its bases in Dubai and Pakistan. With this drastic downsizing of its Pakistan operations, the platform aims to “move forward to a brighter future,” expressing a hope to one day rehire the impacted staff.
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