This means that UPS customers can pick-up or drop-off packages for sending across the world at Jumia’s stations in Kenya, Morocco and Nigeria. Plans are underway to expand the partnership to Ghana and Ivory Coast, and the rest of its markets in Africa (Algeria, Senegal, Tunisia, Uganda and South Africa) thereafter.

Jumia began building its logistics business seven years ago, owing to how fragmented the logistics sector was and as a pathway to grow the number of orders made on its e-commerce marketplace beyond cities — by enabling customers in remote areas to make orders. In 2020, Jumia opened its logistics marketplace to third parties after exclusively reserving it for e-commerce and food vendors operating on its marketplace.

“At the beginning of our journey (launch of the e-commerce platform), 10 years ago, logistics infrastructure was one of the most challenging aspects of our operating environment. This challenge was a catalyst for us to build an unparalleled logistics platform in Africa offering our sellers and consumers reliable, convenient and cost-effective delivery services,” said Jumia senior vice president logistics, Apoorva Kumar.

“Today, we are helping other businesses overcome these infrastructure challenges by giving them access to our logistics platform. We are delighted and humbled by the opportunity to partner up with UPS, a global logistics leader, to offer them last-mile solutions in Africa. We view this as a validation of the strength of our logistics platform as well as an incentive to double down on our efforts to further enhance our services and build a world-class logistics business in Africa,” said Kumar.

In its logistics marketplace, Jumia uses about 600 partners for last-mile delivery, most of whom are small logistics firms. The e-commerce firm has 3,000 pickup stations spread across its 11 markets in Africa, all supported by a technology that “aggregates demand and matches it with supply capacity on the basis of several parameters like quality of service, reachability of network and cost of delivery.”

“UPS’s asset-light approach, like the Jumia partnership, offers a pathway for businesses to quickly and reliably connect to new customers around the world through our global network, potentially accelerating their revenue growth,” said UPS vice president of engineering and operations for Indian subcontinent, Middle East and Africa, Gregory Goba Ble.