Jiji.ng acquires OLX sites in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda

Jiji and OLX have entered an agreement to transfer all OLX assets in Sub-Saharan Africa to Jiji. The Ukranian Genesis classified ads company, Jiji, was launched in Nigeria in 2016.

In 2018, Naspers closed the OLX local offices in Nigeria, Kenya and Ghana. Since then, OLX Nigeria traffic has been significantly lower than Jiji.

The deal is supposed to be finalised in April pending certain regulatory approvals. After this, all OLX sites involved – OLX Nigeria, OLX Ghana, OLX Kenya, OLX Tanzania, and OLX Uganda, will redirect to Jiji.

According to Vladimir Mnogoletniy, Board Director and co-founder of Jiji, “We believe that this transaction is pivotal for Jiji’s business. We are a long-term investor in Africa and believe in the exceptional opportunities that exist in this amazing continent. With this transaction we plan to build the largest Africa-based classifieds business, creating a new experience for Africa’s fastest-developing countries and their combined population of 300 million. We firmly believe that in the next 2-3 years ours will be one of the top 10 classifieds businesses in the world by traffic.”

Sjoerd Nikkelen, General Manager of OLX in Africa, Middle East and Asia comments “We are proud of our achievements in Africa, including the sustainable businesses we have built in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. We continually evaluate our portfolio of classifieds businesses to ensure a disciplined approach to how and where we allocate capital and management time. With our focus on accelerating the growth of other markets, now is an opportune time to sell our interests in these markets. We are pleased that Jiji will continue to provide the exceptional quality of products and services that the customers in these countries have come to know and enjoy from OLX.”

Anton Volyansky, CEO and co-founder of Jiji commented: “Users will always come first for us. We warmly welcome OLX’s customers to the Jiji family and we look forward to our new customers joining Jiji on its journey to empower the lives of its customers by providing a safer, more secure and enjoyable online shopping experience”.

Jiji is currently the largest classified ads site in Nigeria. The site contains over 1 million active ads with over 6 million unique users (most of whom use an app). Over 50k professional sellers sell on Jiji and over 10k of them are paying users.