Jumia Travel

JUMIA TRAVEL
Industry Retail, Ecommerce
Founded 2013
Headquarters Lagos, Nairobi, Dakar
Key people
Paul Midy
Products
Website travel.jumia.com

Jumia Travel is an African online travel agency (OTA) delivering a service of online hotel reservations across the continent. The company provides accommodations ranging from guest houses to luxury hotels, to address the growing demand for travel means from African middle class (both for personnal and business reasons) [1][2][3][4][5]

History

Jumia Travel was founded in 2013 by the E-commerce platform, Africa Internet Group (now Jumia) and is now backed by MTN, Rocket Internet, Millicom, Orange, Axa and financial partners.[6]
Operations started in Nigeria, the largest economy in the Continent, and expanded to more emerging markets in Africa in 2014, starting with Kenya and addressing East Afica and then in Senegal and addressing West Africa. Recently Jumia Travel expanded to Algeria (North Africa).[7]

In 2015 Paul Midy joined Jumia Travel as Chief Executive Officer (CEO). M. Midy holds an engineering degree from Ecole Polytechnique (France) and Columbia University (USA), and after spending 7 years at McKinsey & company.[8]
In June 2016, the company was rebranded from Jovago.com to Jumia Travel, to join other companies in the Jumia ecosystem. In Asia the brand remains as Jovago.com In 2016, Jumia Travel signed a global partnership with AccorHotels to widen the range of high end hotels offered on the website and to work with the French hotel chain to develop their presence across Africa [9]
In 2016, Jumia Group set to become continent’s first unicorn, being valued over 1 billion USD.[10]
Before June 2016, Jumia Travel was known as Jovago.com in Africa. In Asia, the brand name remains Jovago. [11]

The Website

The Jumia Travel website operates out of 10 local offices across Africa and 3 regional headquarters in its main African markets, Lagos (Nigeria), Nairobi (Kenya) and Dakar (Senegal).

The website is available in English and French as well as in other African languages (Yoruba, Ibo, Hausa and Swahili), making Jumia Travel the first global OTA to incorporate local African languages on its website. The customer service provides support 24/7 out its African offices.[12]

Jumia Travel makes money by collecting commission for the online customers they provide the hotels. The commission is agreed with hotels depending on the size and location of the property.
In East Africa, Jumia Travel offers both resident and non-resident rates to encourage people living in the region to travel within neighboring countries. Customers have the option to pay using local payment options including mobile payment solutions such as M-Pesa, SimplePay or MTN’s mobile money M-Pesa, SimplePay or MTN’s mobile money.[13][14]

Jumia Travel incorporates some of the latest technological tools (Mobile apps, Extranet, Progressive Web App and can provide customer support on tools like Whatsapp, Viber for Mobile), following the growing internet and smartphone penetration in Africa.[15][16]

Main Competitors

Awards

The company has won multiple awards as a pioneer in booking hotels online in Africa. These include “Best Hotel Booking Portal” (Lagos 2015), “Leading Online Hotel Booking Company” and the “Best Use of Technology” in Nigeria (Lagos 2015).[17][18]

Jumia Travel also participated in the 39th Africa Travel and Tourism Association annual world congress to promote the development of tourism to and across Africa.

TV Interviews

References

  1. ↑ "Jovago Leans On Local Tourism To Grow In East Africa". AFKInsider. 2016-06-20.
  2. ↑ "Jovago CEO, Paul Midy outlines company's expansion plans". CNBC Africa. 2016-02-12.
  3. ↑ "Menaces terroristes : quelles conséquences sur le tourisme?". RFI. 2016-06-19.
  4. ↑ "Nous voulons faire voyager en low-cost les Africains en Afrique". Le Monde. 2015-11-17.
  5. ↑ "le site de réservation Jovago met une option sur les classes moyennes". Jeune Afrique. 2015-07-08.
  6. ↑ "Rocket Internet Launches Jovago To Bring Online Hotel Booking To Africa". TechCrunch. 2013-08-05.
  7. ↑ "Jovago, le site de réservation d'hôtels en ligne s'installe en Algérie". Huffington Post Magreb. 2015-11-19.
  8. ↑ "Start-up africaine de la semaine : Jumia Travel dépasse le million de visiteurs mensuels". Jeune Afrique. 2015-09-15.
  9. ↑ "Le premier hôtelier du monde s'allie à une start-up pour conquérir l'Afrique". Le Monde. 2016-03-14.
  10. ↑ "Africa Internet Group set to become continent's first 'unicorn'". Financial Time.
  11. ↑ "Jovago rebrands to Jumia Travel". Tnooz. 2016-06-23.
  12. ↑ "Jumia Travel: hospitality industry booming in Ethiopia, internet shut downs 'not good for businesses". DireTube. 2016-09-16.
  13. ↑ "Nairobi provides tourists a glimpse of what the country has to offer". CCTV. 2016-09-28.
  14. ↑ "L'innovation bancaire, nouveau terrain de chasse des start-up africaines". Le Monde AFRIQUE. 2015-02-26.
  15. ↑ "L'innovation bancaire, nouveau terrain de chasse des start-up africaines". Le Monde AFRIQUE. 2015-02-26.
  16. ↑ "Mobile sales to account for 25% of global online travel bookings by 2019". CIO. 2015-09-22.
  17. ↑ "Ondo, GTBank, Etisalat, DLM others win consumersng awards". Vanguard NGR. 2016-02-06.
  18. ↑ "JOVAGO Wins NCC Award For Best Use Of Technology". Blueprint. 2015-12-11.
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