JUMIA CLOSES SHOP IN TANZANIA AND RWANDA WHILE AXING JUMIA TRAVEL
(Posted 11th December 2019)
While shutting down all operations in Rwanda and Tanzania – and across the continent also in Cameroon, reportedly after incurring heavy losses, will Jumia’s Kenya operation terminate a number of their staff, unwelcome news of course ahead of the Festive Season. From information sourced does Jumia in Kenya employ nearly 700 people and redundancies could affect up to 50 staff.
Jumia’s parent company is facing a whopping loss of over 160 million Euros, up from 117 million Euros the previous year, a rise of nearly 40 percent.
As part of a raft of measures to stop the financial bleeding has the company also decided to close Jumia Travel. The travel offspring had offices in Lagos, Abidjan, Dakar, Yaounde, Dar es Salaam, Nairobi and Kampala and the business is now reportedly being taken over by Travelstart, a company founded 10 years ago in South Africa.
Travelstart, according to information available, has operations in South Africa, Bahrain, Botswana, Egypt, Kenya, Kuwait, Morocco, Namibia, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Tanzania, Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Zimbabwe.
It is not known at this stage – other than Travelstart is taking over – if, where two operations exist in a city, i.e. both Jumia Travel and Travelstart are present, if any Jumia Travel staff will be absorbed, their offices taken over or else be closed. It could also not be established if Jumia Travel offices in other locations will remain open under the new owners Travelstart.
