~Testament to increasing global interest in South African online companies ~
uAfrica.com, a South African eCommerce technology company, has raised $1.5 million between global organisation, bidorbuy.com Inc, and private South African investor, Andy Higgins, Managing Director of uAfrica.com.
uAfrica.com is a technology company providing multi-channel cloud based eCommerce services to SMEs across Africa and has been operating in the eCommerce realm since 2004.
“Over the last two years, a substantial portion of locally established online South African eCommerce companies have benefitted from an influx of global investment. This increase is testament to the opportunity the South African market has to offer these investors both from a return perspective and the growth in the number of local skilled experts working on IT and application developments,” said Higgins.
Andy Higgins, founder and former Managing Director of bidorbuy.co.za, joined the team in 2012 following which the company rebranded as uAfrica.com in order to facilitate a broader focus on all aspects of eCommerce.
Higgins, together with uAfrica.com’s Director of Technology, Jaco Roux will continue to lead the company forward, focusing on eCommerce facilities that speak to the local market and meet the local need. “Too often international products offer services that aren’t always applicable to a very local audience – we plan to shift the paradigm as we take International best practices and add relevant localisation giving merchants and consumers the best of both worlds,” said Higgins.
Jaco Jonker, CEO for South Africa’s largest online bidding platform, bidorbuy.co.za, points out that the online retail space has become a significant part of South African shopping trends and that online retailers prefer to use more than one channel. “Therefore, the need to operate or generate sales across multiple web based retail stores or applications will continue to grow, as will the need to manage inventory across these various platforms,” said Jonker, “We made the business decision to partner with the leading eCommerce experts, uAfrica.com, in order to help deliver these specialised services, including multiple channels, to online retailers. This is also fundamental to the future eCommerce growth within the bidorbuy channel.” concluded Jonker.
With game changing products in development and plans to expand further into Africa as well as nurturing the growth of the industry through the eCommerce Conference and the eCommerce Awards, uAfrica.com is definitely one of the South African technology companies to watch this year.
