FounderStorytellerEntrepreneur

RAFI SHARIF

Building Companies. Telling Stories. Creating Impact.

Entrepreneur, co-founder of Ride Sheba, and storyteller documenting the journey of building ideas that move people forward.

2016
Started the journey
0+
Photography honors
0
Districts reachable
0
Company co-founded

About

A storyteller who learned to build.

Entrepreneur, founder, storyteller, and builder from Bangladesh — using business and the camera to move people forward.

Portrait of Rafi Sharif, co-founder of Ride Sheba
Rafi Sharif · Co-Founder, Ride Sheba

It started in 2016 with a camera. What began as photography quickly became something larger — a way of seeing people, reading situations, and understanding the world by paying close attention to it.

Through years of shooting I developed storytelling and creative thinking, entered multiple photography competitions, and earned recognition and local awards. More than trophies, it gave me the communication and leadership instincts that come from documenting real people in real moments.

That same curiosity pulled me toward business. Real-world experience sharpened an entrepreneurial mindset — and led me to co-found Ride Sheba, a transportation platform serving customers across Bangladesh.

Today I keep doing both: building innovative transportation solutions while documenting the stories, people, and culture of a country in motion. I believe I'm part of a new generation of founders proving that world-class companies can be built right here in Bangladesh.

Home town

Kushtia, Bangladesh

Education

Bachelor's in Philosophy

Govt. Titumir College · University of Dhaka

HSC — Kushtia Government College

Completed 2020

SSC — Dinomoni High School, Kushtia

Completed 2018

Interests

EntrepreneurshipTravellingPhotographyStorytellingTechnologyTransportation InnovationVideo EditingCommunity Development

The Founder Story

From one frame to a moving company.

It started with a camera and a habit of paying attention. That habit became a way of thinking — and eventually, a way of building.

2016

Picking up the camera

I started photography at 2016 — not as a hobby, but as a way to understand people. Every frame was a lesson in observation, timing, and seeing what others walked past.

2017 — 2021

Storytelling & recognition

Years of shooting sharpened how I tell stories. Along the way the work earned recognition and awards across multiple photography competitions — proof that a clear point of view travels.

2021 — Present

University, leadership & entrepreneurship

University years became a lab for leadership. I moved from documenting how people live to asking how I could change it — building teams, testing ideas, and learning to think in systems.

The turning point

Co-founding Ride Sheba

The entrepreneurial pull won. I co-founded Ride Sheba, a transportation platform serving customers across Bangladesh — built to make moving through this country simpler, safer, and more dignified.

What's next

The long game

I'm building for the next decade, not the next quarter — companies and stories that outlast the hype and leave the country a little more in motion than I found it.

The Company

Building Ride Sheba

A transportation platform serving customers across Bangladesh — built on a simple belief: how a country moves shapes how it grows.

01

The mission

Make reliable, modern transportation accessible to ordinary people — beyond the big cities, into the places most platforms ignore.

02

The approach

Technology and operational discipline working together, so the experience feels effortless to the rider and sustainable for the driver.

03

The vision

An enduring company that becomes part of how Bangladesh moves — and a model for what young founders here can build.

Rafi Sharif at Agargaon metro station, Dhaka
Agargaon · Dhaka — where mobility meets the everyday

Impact & Achievements

Outcomes over certificates.

A snapshot of what the work has produced — in business, craft, and community.

Founded a moving company

Co-founded Ride Sheba and helped take it from idea to an operating transportation platform serving customers across Bangladesh.

Award-winning photography

Recognized across multiple photography competitions for a documentary eye — the foundation of how I tell every story.

Leadership & teams

Built and led teams through university and venture work — turning creative instinct into operational execution.

Nationwide reach

Working toward a platform that reaches across all 64 districts — not just the capital, but the whole country.

Community impact

Creating livelihoods for drivers and using storytelling to spotlight people and places that rarely get a stage.

A voice for founders

Writing and speaking about entrepreneurship, mobility, and youth ambition in Bangladesh — building an audience for the long term.

Skills & Toolkit

Built across business and craft.

A founder's range — strategy and leadership on one side, visual storytelling and modern tools on the other.

Business & Leadership

EntrepreneurshipStartup DevelopmentBusiness StrategyMarketing StrategyLeadershipCommunity Building

Creative

PhotographyVisual StorytellingAdobe PhotoshopCapCutVideo EditingContent Creation

Technical

Microsoft ExcelResearch & AnalysisProject CoordinationDigital Communication

AI Toolkit — image, video & workflow

ChatGPTClaudePerplexityMidjourneyAdobe FireflyRunwaySoraGoogle GeminiElevenLabsCapCut AI

Selected Photography

Where the storytelling began.

Photography is a supporting craft here, not the headline — a tool for storytelling that shaped how I think as an entrepreneur and how I understand people, communities, and culture.

Portrait on railway tracks, Bangladesh
The road ahead · Bangladesh
Portrait by the sea
Coast · Bay of Bengal
Portrait, campus
Campus · Dhaka
Portrait at metro station
Agargaon · Dhaka

Selected frames, 2016 — present. Full portfolio and prints available on request.

Thoughts & Journal

Notes from the build.

Entrepreneurship

What photography taught me about building companies

Framing, patience, and knowing what to leave out — the same instincts behind a great photo run a startup.

12 Jan 2026 · 7 min

Future of Mobility

Why Bangladesh needs founders, not just apps

Technology is the easy part. The hard, worthwhile part is reshaping how a hundred million people move.

28 Dec 2025 · 9 min

Leadership · Growth

The discipline of the long game

On building for the next decade in a world addicted to the next quarter — and why patience is a strategy.

04 Dec 2025 · 6 min

Vision for Bangladesh

A country in motion deserves founders who think big.

I believe the next decade belongs to young Bangladeshi entrepreneurs who refuse to wait for permission — who build technology that respects the people it serves, and who treat mobility, opportunity, and dignity as one and the same problem.

Ride Sheba is one answer. The bigger goal is to show a generation that world-class companies don't have to be built somewhere else. They can be built here, by us, now.

Contact & Collaboration

Let's build something worth it.

Open to speaking opportunities, partnerships, media, and the right business conversations. I read every message personally.

rafisharif@ridesheba.com
SpeakingPartnershipsMediaInvestment
Chat on WhatsApp