What Hatef does

Hatef is an Iranian, open-source, privacy-first search engine founded in 2024 by Hatef Rostamhani and operated as an independent, bootstrapped company without external venture capital. It serves privacy-conscious Iranian and international users seeking an alternative to mainstream search engines, with a value proposition built on user data ownership, transparent ranking signals, and full code transparency hosted publicly on the HatefSystems GitHub organization.

The platform operates as a two-product portfolio. The core offering is the Hatef Search Engine, a web search product whose ranking signals and code are publicly documented. Complementing it is a self-serve Web Crawler Service that lets users discover and map all pages of a website, offered in three tiers — Quick Scan (5 pages, 2 depth levels), Standard Crawl (50 pages, 3 depth levels), and Deep Analysis (200 pages, 5 depth levels) — with custom settings, JSON/CSV export, and optional email notification. Both products are accessible directly via hatef.ir with no sales interaction, supporting a product-led growth motion. Community participation is structurally embedded through GitHub contributions and public RFC voting on roadmap decisions.

Hatef's business model is sponsorship-driven rather than advertising-based. The company offers a six-tier sponsorship program ranging from Individual (12M Toman/year) through Startup, Silver, Gold, Platinum/Strategic (50B+ Toman/year minimum), and an in-kind Infrastructure sponsor tier for hardware/bandwidth support. Strict separation between sponsorship and ranking is a stated policy, with periodic transparency reports promised. Payments are accepted in Iranian Rial via the Vandar payment gateway and in Bitcoin for international sponsors. The company has 1-10 employees, is based in Iran, and has no disclosed institutional investors, parent company, or external funding.

Name

Hatef

Legal name

Hatef (هاتف)

Website

https://hatef.ir

Company type

Private

Founded year

2025

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

New York

HQ country

United States

HQ region

North America

Markets served

GTM type

B2B and B2C

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Personnel, Operations, Marketing or Sales

Revenue model

1. Sponsorship Programs: Multi-tiered annual sponsorship programs from Individual (12M Toman/year) to Platinum/Strategic (50B+ Toman/year minimum). Benefits include sponsor badges, early feature access, API quotas, marketing collaboration, engineering consulting hours, advisory board seats, and joint research opportunities. Payment accepted in Iranian Rial via Vandar gateway and Bitcoin.
2. Web Crawling Services: Basic crawling tiers appear to be free (Fast/Standard/Deep scan options available on self-serve platform). Advanced custom settings and likely higher-volume usage may generate revenue through enhanced service tiers.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels3 records

Marketing channels3 records

Core offering

Hatef operates an open-source, privacy-focused Iranian web search engine that emphasizes user data ownership, transparent ranking signals, and community-driven development. The platform is complemented by a self-serve Web Crawler Service offering tiered website analysis (Quick Scan, Standard Crawl, Deep Analysis) with configurable depth and page limits and JSON/CSV export. Revenue is generated through tiered sponsorship programs that provide brand visibility, API quotas, engineering consulting, and advisory board access without influencing search rankings.

Product overview

Hatef offers a dual-product portfolio centered on privacy-focused web search and web crawling services. The core offering is the Hatef Search Engine, an open-source, Iranian-developed search platform that prioritizes user data ownership, code transparency, and community-driven development. Complementing the search engine is the Web Crawler Service, a site analysis tool available in three tiers (Quick Scan, Standard Crawl, and Deep Analysis) that discovers, maps, and exports website page structures. The two products share a foundation of transparency and user privacy while serving complementary use cases: direct consumer search and technical website analysis.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Products and services

• Hatef Search Engine An open-source, Iranian privacy-focused web search engine that emphasizes user data ownership, code transparency, and community contribution. It provides fast, private web search with fully transparent ranking signals and publicly published code and policy updates, targeting privacy-conscious individuals, researchers, and developers.
• Web Crawler Service

Segments4 records

Ideal customer profiles4 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature3 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Ecosia: Independent search engine funding tree-planting with revenue, operating its own crawler and index — comparable to Hatef as a mission-driven, non-Google search alternative with a differentiated value proposition.
• Qwant: European independent search engine emphasizing privacy and neutrality; directly comparable as another regional, non-Google search alternative targeting privacy-conscious users.
• Startpage: Privacy-focused search engine that delivers Google results without tracking or personalized data collection; comparable to Hatef in its user-facing privacy promise, though it relies on an external index.
• Brave Search: Independent, privacy-focused search engine operated by Brave Software, with its own web index and no user tracking — the closest direct competitor to Hatef's open, privacy-first positioning.
• Mojeek: UK-based independent search engine with its own crawler and index and a no-tracking policy — directly comparable to Hatef as a smaller, independent, crawler-and-index-owning search alternative.
• DuckDuckGo: Privacy-respecting search engine that does not track users; comparable to Hatef in core value proposition (private search, transparent ranking philosophy) though primarily a meta-search wrapper rather than an independent index.
• Kagi: Paid, ad-free, privacy-respecting search engine with its own index and transparent ranking; comparable to Hatef in independent-index positioning and user-funded (non-ad) business model.

Broad incumbents

• Yandex: Major general-purpose search engine and broader internet platform; relevant as a comparable regional search incumbent (and as a reference point for what a scaled, locally-rooted search alternative looks like in markets like Iran/Russia).

Emerging players

• Marginalia Search: Small-scale, independent, non-commercial search engine with its own crawler focused on surfacing non-commercial and niche web content; comparable to Hatef as a small, indie index-owning search project.
• SearXNG: Open-source metasearch engine that aggregates results from multiple sources while preserving user privacy; comparable to Hatef in the open-source, privacy-first community-driven ethos, though SearXNG does not operate its own primary index.

Market position

Strengths5 records

Weaknesses5 records

Competitive moat2 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• GitHubgithub.com/HatefSystems

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles1 record

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Hatef