Dosty: How an Azerbaijani Startup is Changing the Pet Care Market

Ayaz Ahmadov, city — Baku, founder and CEO of Dosty, LinkedIn

About Me

I am the founder and CEO of Dosty, a super app for pet owners. I have been working in marketing for over 20 years: I studied to become a marketer and have worked in this field my entire life. My experience spans telecommunications, sports marketing, creating strategic digital infrastructure, a unified user profile, and complex data analytics systems.

My latest project is Dosty. Once I bring it to a certain stage, I plan to get involved in investments and become an angel investor—not just a businessman, but specifically an IT angel, investing in young startups and founders in Azerbaijan and the region.

One important observation: now, as I try for the first time to scale a classic IT startup abroad, I see that our countries and regions lack true angel investors—those who have gone the path from founder to successful exit and now invest in new projects. These are precisely the people who can give a powerful boost to the development of the startup ecosystem as a whole.

Launching the Startup

The idea for Dosty emerged during the pandemic. At that time, I already owned an IT company involved in creating strategic infrastructure with a unified user profile. I was interested in applying this knowledge to a product for pet owners.

I own three Labrador Retrievers. During the lockdown, I downloaded many pet-related apps to study the market.

It is important to understand that during the pandemic, about 60% of PetTech companies appeared—that was a real boom. Most products are focused on basic services: connecting with a veterinarian, grooming, food, and training. But honestly, as a pet owner, I understand that such basic things happen rarely, maybe once or twice a year.

The real problem for owners is their pet's behavior. An animal lives with you for 10–12 years, and its character changes. What worked yesterday may not work today. A dog reacts to different factors and changes its behavior, while the owner often does not notice these changes.

Dosty helps maintain a harmonious life with your pet. First, we help “decode” the animal’s language and understand what is happening. Second, we provide reminders about important things—vaccinations, medications, etc.—taking into account the breed and specific characteristics of the pet. Third, we offer 24/7 advice on any issues related to your pet’s life.

And, in addition, we have a feature that connects the owner with a global community of pet lovers.

Target Audience

We already have 23,000 users, and they are all united into one large community. For example, if you are a Labrador owner living in Kazakhstan, you can ask a question—and all Labrador owners on Dosty will receive your message and be able to answer. This exchange of real knowledge and experience is one of the key values of our application.

We created the product that we ourselves wanted to use. We launched Dosty in February 2024, and since then growth has been steady: 41% of users are from the US, and the total number is already 23,000.

Assembling the team was simple—about 80% of the current employees I knew from previous projects. This is a team of 22 people, mostly programmers, whom we supplemented with the necessary specialists. The atmosphere in the team is friendly and productive—we know and respect each other well, working toward a common goal: to create a super app that helps care for your pets.

My co-founder is Javid Garayev. He has extensive experience in business development and marketing: he was the marketing director of the local football association and currently holds the position of director of the Baku Olympic Stadium, as well as a member of the UEFA marketing committee. We have a clear division of responsibilities, and together we lead the project.

Incubation Programs

For me, participating in pitch competitions is more than just fighting for victory. I love these competitions because they are an excellent way to constantly improve my presentation skills. At each pitch, I try to show different versions of the presentation, constantly preparing and improving my delivery.

We have already won several times—in Europe and in the US. In 2024, Purina recognized us as one of the most promising European PetTech startups. We also won a competition organized by Mars in America and participated in the Wolf Summit and competitions in the MENA region.

As for investments—we were lucky. We have an angel investor—a woman who actively helps animals and is considered a strong advocate for them. The second investor is Caucasus Ventures, a local Azerbaijani fund. We successfully closed the Pre-Seed round and are currently gradually approaching the Seed round.

Challenges

In our region, amidst the hype around startups, there is a surge in the glorification of founderhood—it seems like every second person wants to become a startup founder. This raises two questions for me.

1. If everyone becomes a founder, what will happen to doctors, bankers, and other professions? Not everyone should be an entrepreneur; it is simply impossible.
2. If you still want to become a founder and run a business, you need to approach this consciously. A business is like a child, and it is impossible to run five businesses at once. If you decide to create a startup, you must devote yourself to it completely.

I am 39 years old, I have three children, and I know that a startup requires huge sacrifices. You are betting on a venture with no guarantees of success. It is stress, mood swings, external and internal problems—in the family and at work. You need to be able to balance all this, taking responsibility for both the team and your home.

If you are a CEO or team leader, people trust your vision and decisions. You are responsible for every word you say, for how and when you deliver information. You must always be ready for this.

Many young founders approach the matter unconsciously—as if it were a game. I advise those who want to start a startup to first go through the school of corporate work. I myself worked in a corporation, and it taught me a lot.

When you have just graduated from university, you have many ideas, but an idea itself means nothing—it is important to know how to implement it. There are many problems along the way. You are too young, you have little experience, a narrow network, and few professional skills. You do not even know how to pay the electricity bill on your own, so how are you going to make decisions on multi-million-dollar projects?

This is a responsible decision. My advice is to weigh everything and think about whether this is truly for you. Maybe it is better to become a successful banker or a top manager in a large company. Do not start a business just because of hype or fashion.

Achievements

My main achievement is the team I managed to assemble. People who accepted and understood the shared vision, were able to break it down into many practical and tactical tasks, which then come together into a single working mechanism.

Creating a super app concept is difficult, especially in such a complex B2C market where it is easy to get lost. But the team has a clear vision and understanding of the goal.

Professionally, I have many implemented projects from my past career, but in Dosty, the main success is the speed of product development. We worked on it for a long time before launch, but since going to market—less than two years ago—we have already made four major updates.

We actively collect feedback from users, analyze it carefully, and quickly adapt the product. This has allowed us to better understand the behavior of owners and their pets, as well as accurately calculate how much investment is needed to achieve specific goals for users and revenue.

We have minimized guesswork in our operations as much as possible—I consider this our great achievement.

Plans

Regarding the startup, we have ambitious plans for the next 10–12 months. We want to reach 300,000 to 500,000 registered users in the B2C segment. In the B2B division, we plan for at least 100–120 services to use our platform: groomers, veterinary clinics, breeders, shelters, and others.

In addition, we are working on the digitalization of the Azerbaijani PET passport—creating a link between animals and owners through the state portal GOVAZ.

We are also initiating a social movement to change legislation regarding animal cruelty in Azerbaijan. We want to become the locomotive of this kind and peaceful process.

At the same time, we dedicate a lot of time to research. We have collected data on pet owners—their profiles, motivations, and needs. In the future, we plan to personalize the Dosty experience based not only on the problem the user came with but also on their psychotype.

For example, two different owners may have the same training problem, but the approaches to solving it will be different—depending on the person’s character and reactions. We want to adapt advice for each individual to help build harmonious relationships with their pet.

Our long-term plan is to bring the project to one million users within three years.

As for investments, our main goal is to reach profitability. After that, attracting venture capital will be less important for us. In the Petcare segment, there are major players—Mars and Purina—and we see great value in cooperating with them.

We have not participated in accelerator programs, but we plan to join two specialized ones—Purina Unleashed and Mars Leap, which support PetTech startups. At this stage, we are not considering other accelerators.