Nigeria car-listing market marketplace, Cars45, appears to be having a field day at the hands of acquirers. Barely a year after it was acquired by OLX Group, the company’s ownership has, once again, changed hands. The latest buyer is Jiji, one of Africa’s largest marketplaces for classifieds which has announced its acquisition of the transactional car marketplace for an undisclosed amount.

“We are proud to have built a trusted buying and selling experience in autos. It makes sense to combine online and offline expertise. Merging with Jiji is aimed at creating a new kind of automotive retail experience for users in Africa. We are confident of jointly building an African Champion in the O2O Automotive Sector. Together we look forward to making transactions transparent and convenient for our customers, dealers and franchisees across all our current and future markets,” Soumobroto Ganguly, CEO of Cars45, said. 

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A Timeline Of Cars45’s Winding Journey To Acquisitions

• In 2017, Frontier Car Group (FCG), a Berlin-based company that builds used-car marketplaces with a focus on emerging markets, invested $5 million in Cars45 which was founded in 2016.

•  As a result, FCG became the largest stakeholder and parent company in the Nigerian automobile industry. 

• However in 2020, OLX Group purchased Cars45 from FCG through its OLX Autos brand.

• FCG secured $400 million from OLX Group (a division of Prosus, the Netherlands-based separate tech holdings of South African tech giant Naspers) by virtue of the acquisition. At the time of the acquisition by OLX Group, FCG was valued at $700 million.

• OLX Autos, however, shuttered FCG’s Berlin operations in March this year, but maintained Cars45 and two other brands: CarFirst in Pakistan and WeBuyAnyCar in the United States. 

• The announcement in March claimed that OLX Autos’ new concentration was on Asia and Latin America, implying that Cars45 would be sold. 

• With the latest announcement, it appears that OLX Group has abandoned most of its African operations, with the exception of South Africa.

As The Acquisition Galore Continues For Cars45, Why Is It Important For Jiji?

On why the acquisition was important, co-founder and board member of Jiji Vladimir Mnogoletniy noted that vehicles are the second-most popular category on Jiji. He says that the category has over $3 billion in listings out of a total of over $10 billion on the site (real estate commands about $7 billion).

“We have leading positions in all markets we’re present in and are definitely the classifieds leader in the region. Also, we are probably the largest e-commerce company in Africa by GMV,” he said. 

As a result of the purchase, Cars45 will be able to expand its car category. Furthermore, Cars45 will integrate its activities in Nigeria (main market), Ghana, and Kenya with Jiji in order to strengthen its position in the classifieds industry. 

In addition, by acquiring Cars45, Jiji will be able to address trust and safety problems that have plagued the company in the past, as well as provide a unique car-buying and selling experience through its transactional marketplace model. As a result of Jiji’s supremacy in online classifieds, Cars45 users will profit, a statement from the company noted. 

“We will integrate this into one company because this acquisition has a lot of benefits for both. It’s a very common practice when marketplace and transactional business models work together as one project,” co-founder and CEO Anton Volyansky said regarding the integration of both platforms. “For instance, a seller of a car, it’s convenient to sell both ways via a marketplace or auction model. So, it would be like a seamless process for selling the car.”

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Cars45’s primary value, according to Jiji CFO David Ojo, is its network of inspection centers, where automobiles are evaluated for more than 200 characteristics. Unlike a classifieds marketplace where quality checks are lacking, transactional models used by platforms like Cars45 provide quality checks and thorough information on a car’s condition using several databases.

why Jiji acquired Cars45 why Jiji acquired Cars45

Charles Rapulu Udoh

Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
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