Africa’s largest e-commerce platform—Jumia has closed its operations in Tanzania.
According to Reuters, the company gave out the news of its exodus which noted: “We have to focus our resources on our other markets. It is more important now than ever to put our focus and resources where they can bring the best value and help us thrive,” the statement reads.
The company which as of today has its operations in twelve countries out of 54 in Africa, has been experiencing a rather stiff challenge which includes significant losses for the past two years.
According to Jumia’s financial report, the company’s operating loss increased from $ 46 million in the second quarter of 2018 to $ 73 million in the second quarter of 2019.
The company shut down in Tanzania comes after 10 days whereby the Cameroon market lost Jumia as well.
Jumia came in Tanzania five years ago but also it still operates in other small markets in East Africa—Rwanda and Uganda.
Jumia offers a wide range of services stratified as Jumia Marketplace (buying gadgets, groceries, and apparels), Jumia Logistics (booking flights, hotel affairs, and mobile data plans recharging) and Jumia Pay: paying bills and ordering food services.
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Jumia operations landscape
Jumia is currently operating in six regions running 12 countries, with more than 600 million people and with more than 29 million products, hotels, restaurants, and other services listed
According to Jumia, it takes up to 2 seconds 1 transaction or leads to occur, within its 4.8 million active customers which rose from 3.2 in 2018.
The company has built is services to leveraging technology to deliver innovative, convenient and affordable online services to consumers while helping businesses grow as they use our platform to reach and serve consumers.
Further, in 2018, more than 81,000 local African companies and entrepreneurs have partnered with Jumia which attracts millions of customers. Jumia has also attracted 5,000 direct jobs and many more via sellers and logistics partners.
Jumia has handled more than 13.4 million packages in 2018, 90 per cent of items sold in the marketplace, with over $ 1.5 trillion market opportunity.
The company has also managed to integrate with relevant banks, telecom operators and electronic wallets. While offering cash options for a fully comprehensive payment experience adapted to customer needs.
Further, in 2018 Jumia managed to score 54 per cent of all transactions executed on its customized platform Jumia Pay.
However, Jumia has managed to make some significant efforts in garnering profits as noted in the financial report: Gross profit increased by 93.6 per cent from €8.9 ($9 million) million in the second quarter of 2018 to €17.3 million ($ 18 million) in the second quarter of 2019, as a result of increased platform monetization.
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