Hi, my name is Raj and I was born in Mumbai.  While I was growing up, I was privileged to be surrounded by a brotherhood.  We were a mix of Hindu’s and Muslims who openly discussed religion, faith, and life.  When we would hang out on the weekends, my Muslim brothers would excuse themselves to pray, up to five times a day.  It didn’t matter where they were, they would find a piece of material or use a flattened cardboard box to pray. When I turned 21 I moved to New York to study.  I got a job at Dunkin Donuts working the night shift.  One day I walked into the back office and my coworker, Mansoor, had laid out a clean garbage bag to pray on.  I asked Mansoor why he didn’t use a prayer rug (also known in Islam as a Namaaz mat), and he responded that it was easier and quicker to use other materials instead of carrying around or storing a large prayer mat at work.  It had occurred to me this issue was widespread, and, at that moment, I knew that I wanted to design a portable prayer mat that would allow my Muslim brothers and sisters to pray to their God anywhere with ease and confidence.  

Fast forward to today, I am currently living in Hong Kong and working in the field of designing, sourcing and manufacturing products.  My job is to work with entrepreneurs who want to bring their design ideas into reality.  I recently visited San Francisco and saw the products that I assisted my client to design in stores!  Seeing these products create value to consumers made me confident in my idea to design the portable prayer mat and this is how ‘iNamaaz’ came into existence.  

Mansoor and I are working on this together, a Hindu and a Muslim, making prayer possible anywhere. How is this different from a yoga mat or a current Namaaz rug you might ask? Muslims are required to pray on their knees, we wanted to make sure it was padded for comfort.  We conducted interviews with a number of Imam’s to understand the finer details on how the traditional Namaaz rug could be improved.  Taking into consideration several issues with the standard rug and ideas on how to improve, Mansoor and I created multiple samples until we birthed the perfect iNamaaz mat to carry around.  Our mat is the same size as a standard Naamaz rug, however, we also added extra features - thick, lightweight, durable, high quality and the aesthetics catering mainly to the religion of Islam.  One of the consistent responses we received from the Imam’s we interviewed was that Namaaz rugs are expensive to clean due to the dry-cleaning costs.  Our focus was to combat this by using a material that was odorless, easy to clean and quick drying.  

While designing the mats, our top priority was portability. After many designs, we built a sleek, lightweight jet black case to carry the iNamaaz mat anywhere, building prayer into anyone lifestyle.  The carry case for the iNamaaz rug is the rationale behind us trying to raise funds which require us to open mold for the design specifications.

Mat case -

Mat Designs -

Arch iNamaaz -

Mecca iNamaaz -

Islam  iNamaaz-

Size of the Mat - 

Thickness - 

Printing Process - 

We are using the best printing factory for these iNamaaz mats. Working in the sourcing field we understand that printing is very important and that's why we using the printing machines that will keep the prints on these mats for a longer time.

 PLAY

Why a $20,000 target? 

To ensure that we deliver, we have obtained manufacturer and shipping quotes for the iNamaaz mat from more the 10 factories. The mold tooling for the case is the largest expense as we are building one from scratch, followed by the mat itself.  

We've also added risk mitigation factors to account for other variables; LaunchGood failed payments and issues fixing or remaking our injection mold tooling may incur unforeseen costs.

If we meet our goal on LaunchGood, all iNamaaz mats will be shipped at the end of September with an email will be sent out with the tracking information.  

What we can guarantee is that we will be 100% accountable for every challenge that comes our way with frequent, no-nonsense updates. We are fully dedicated to iNamaaz and will not stop until it is in your hands.

iNamaazs’ final dimensions of the carry case may change slightly as we finalize our CAD designs for manufacturability. If there are space-saving optimizations that can be made, we will surely take them into consideration.

Backing our project is not the same thing as buying an off-the-shelf Namaaz rug. It is about backing the idea that prayer can happen anywhere and anytime with a convenient and comfortable solution to Muslims worldwide.  We think iNamaazhas some exciting possibilities for millennials on the go and we need your help to share it with the world. If there are sudden unforeseen circumstances that affect the product's viability, we will be fully accountable to our backers. We will do everything we can to honor our commitment to our backers.

 Thank You! 

In addition to our family & friends, we want to thank

• Iqbal Singh, our super creative Co-Director and Cinematographer.

• Zaira Budhrani for Co-Directing the launch video, providing feedback on the design specification, aesthetics of the product, video, and content.  Thank you for continuously testing iNamaaz and being a huge support to us since the early stages of iNamaaz. 

• Aqeel Butt, Bonnie Leung, Darren Terry, Lydia Tsang and Matthew Brien for helping us out with a great performance in our launch video.

• Shane Davis for letting us film our video onsite.

• Our partners at the manufacturing facility who were just as invested as we were in designing and creating our baby.  

• Our faithful family and friends for their understanding as we fail to return calls, emails, and miss events in the interest of bringing iNamaaz to life.