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CanGo Exploits the Online Retail Space Left By Jumia Exit in Rwanda

December 16, 2019

The vacuum created in the Rwandan online retail sector via the sudden exit of Africa’s major online retail outlet, Jumia is likely to be filled by CanGo, a local startup that was previously engaged in taxi-hailing services. CanGo which has good presence in the East and Central Africa region through its SafeMotos taxi hailing services say it will embark on a reorganization that will birth a new operation that will fill the void left in online food delivery space in Rwanda with the development.

With Jumia’s exit from the country, CanGo has explained that it is in the final process of the operationalisation of its mobile application which will enable it launch out into various ventures from its taxi hailing business to bike hailing, retail and food delivery. “Our mobile app will be soon available on the App Store and Google Play!” the company posted on its social media platforms pointing to January 2020 as the month in which the service will be available. Incidentally, January is the month Jumia announced they would be completely folding business in Rwanda – most precisely on January 9.

According to Barrett Nash, Co-founder of CanGo, Jumia’s exit was the type of opportunity CanGo has been waiting for noting that “I’ve been testing our new food delivery system in Kinshasa and for me this is a great opportunity”.

Jumia, perceived as Africa’s first unicorn, revealed recently that it will suspend its operations in Rwanda in January after it emerged that it was making significant losses in some of the markets where it operates. Partly, the suspension of its business units is attributed to challenges of digital payments, delivery and logistical infrastructure especially in fragmented markets where it has been operating. It is true in markets like Rwanda, where the majority of people still prefer traditional ways of buying goods and services despite the increasing number of smartphones, internet penetration and plummeting data costs.

Sources say that many Rwandans found it hard to buy into Jumia’s services as expensive compared to the traditional way of doing things. A cost of getting food and drink delivered, for instance, was somewhere between Rwf1, 000 (about $1) and Rwf1, 500 ($1.6). This negatively affected Jumia’s investment in the country. However, CanGo’s co-founder Nash believes this will not be a major issue with his outfit as he is of the view that “there will be no break in on-demand food services in Kigali,” saying that they “were going to begin testing before Christmas anyway.”

He asked colleagues to start sharing the restaurants that are must-haves on the platform. Efforts to reach the company were unsuccessful. But people who have used the service already believe it will be a great replacement for Jumia. Some noted that CanGo is preferable because they are fast and cheaper than Jumia. Others admitted that CanGo drivers seem to have better grasp of the use Google maps than Jumia’s. However critics say that the fact that CanGo was still using WhatsApp platform instead of a dedicated app may be responsible for the edge they have over Jumia, but if they want to expand and grow, they will have to launch their dedicated app, which they are about to launch.

Kelechi Deca

Kelechi Deca has over two decades of media experience, he has traveled to over 77 countries reporting on multilateral development institutions, international business, trade, travels, culture, and diplomacy. He is also a petrol head with in-depth knowledge of automobiles and the auto industry

CanGo Builds First SuperApp in Central Africa

December 3, 2019

CanGo, the on demand services company with a technology office in Nairobi, Kenya and current operations in Kinshasa and Kigali has launched an interconnected on demand services together in a single smartphone application aimed at consumers within the central African regional market. Sources at CanGo say that the SuperApp is poised to transform lives across the Central African region as it will enable users to achieve so many options at a go like hailing a motorcycle taxi, order food, make orders from a supermarket and so many other things

CanGo’s initial plan was to design an app-based motorcycle taxi model, but considering best practices in larger markets, it had to adjust to focus on even bigger plans. Speaking on the development CCo-founder Barret Nashsaid that “what we realised is we’ve built a logistics network [being that] motorcycles can move anything — people, pizza, or a bag of potatoes. Users have multiple services they want to benefit from, so we started thinking of this as a Super App by the influence of a company called Gojek in Indonesia.” CanGo’s goal he added is to use motorcycle-hailing to build its network after which it will release additional verticals into the same mobile application. The logistics backbone is expected to ultimately make incorporating more revenue streams seamless.

According to Nash, the platform currently boasts of 165 riders and 12,000 registered users, 1,250 of which actively engage rides and other logistics services weekly. All these are in spite of the country’s strong bureaucratic system which could inhibit startup growth, and people’s slow culture of transiting to new innovations. However, he hopes that tech penetration will soon be higher than what obtains now in the country. “Over another year, we’re working to scale in Kinshasa, by growing 20 to 30 times over what our current volume is. We’ll also include around eight new service verticals on the app,” Nash affirms.

Geographical expansion should follow, as he believes that at that stage, CanGo would have grown strong enough to withstand competition in Kinshasa. This will include additional cities in DRC (Lubumbashi and Goma) and other Central African nations (Angola and Rwanda). Ultimately, it is expected that CanGo’s first-comer advantage would make it scale fast while the region is still in the pioneering years in tech adoption.

“What we’re doing is providing a safe, convenient, and affordable transportation solution. We allow you to move around the city with ease and also bring the best of the city’s services to you,” says Nash.

The startup’s model has riders register their bikes on the platform, get onboarded after verification, and then linked with customers through the mobile application. And as is common with ride-hailing platforms, CanGo riders pay a commission on every trip. “We take a commission for every trip/order. For ride-hailing, it’s 20%, while for other on-demand services, it’s about 5% which varies based on the product moved. Although 50% of our rides are discounted at the moment,” explains Barrett.

Although bootstrapped in its early days, at no point has funding stalled the startup’s growth, and this is for an obvious reason — CanGo is operating within an untapped ecosystem in the region. Getting into the SOSV accelerator program in Ireland in its first year largely set the business on the right track. And it has since survived on revenue and venture capital funds.

Earlier this year, CanGo closed a $1.1million funding raise, led by Battery Road Digital Holdings; Silicon Valley VC, TRUCKS; SOSV; Dubai-based firm, HALA; ZEPHYR ACORN, and PAN Group. This round has bolstered the startup’s confidence to plan further expansion into other Central Africa nations while also attracting more investors’ interest.

Kelechi Deca