In just 18 months, Moove, an African mobility fintech, is already expanding its footprints across the African continent as it rolls operations into Nairobi, its first city in East Africa, but its sixth African city.
Moove is doing this with the strategic partnership of Uber, Lori, and Sendy to expand their vehicle and product offerings to customers, and also to allow ride-hailing and delivery drivers to purchase motorcycles for Uber Connect, UberEats deliveries and UberBoda trips.
After the recent partnership with pan-African e-logistics platform Lori Systems, Moove has expanded its logistics vehicle offering with Kenyan fulfillment and last-mile logistics company, Sendy, a series-B end-to-end logistics, retail and freight company, to fuel the growth of Africa’s trucking and logistics industry. The fintech company’s foray into the East African market will give Moove the room to drive closer to its goal of democratizing vehicle ownership by providing revenue-based vehicle financing across Africa, the company said.
With cost of lending in Kenya almost twice that of South Africa’s and the average loan deposit standing at 10 percent and 30 percent, affordability is still an issue for entrepreneurs who lack a credit history, and a typical financing hurdle on the continent.
Moove says it intends to use the market opportunity to enable drivers to leverage its alternative credit-scoring technology and gain access to brand new vehicles which creates better job opportunities within the mobility industry.
Meanwhile, lack of financing for Africa trucks stands at less than one percent, deeply illustrating the size of the market opportunity for Moove in solving the problem of access to vehicle financing on the continent and addressing a similar supply constraint faced by many mobility and ride-hailing market places.
On the back of the recent launch of its first two-wheeler bike product, Moove Xpress, in Lagos, the revenue-based vehicle financing company is expanding the new vehicle class to East Africa. As a result of the partnership with Uber, drivers in Nairobi will have access to Moove Xpress bikes for UberConnect (peer to peer delivery), UberBoda trips and UberEats food deliveries. Drivers will be empowered by Moove’s vehicle financing solution, which gives them the flexibility to increase their earnings and productivity.
At the moment, the two-wheeler hailing market in sub-Saharan Africa, estimated at $80 billion, is plagued by a lack of access to new vehicles, as well as a lack of regulation for both drivers and riders. Moove is growing its reach in East Africa, in order to increase asset ownership of brand new motorbikes while ensuring regulatory compliance in the sector, ultimately leveraging ride-hailing and delivery apps to boost revenue.
Commenting on the expansion, Ladi Delano, co-founder and CEO of Moove, said: “Kenya already has a thriving mobility and entrepreneurial industry for us to tap into and roll out our financing solutions, so we’re very excited to be launching into Nairobi, our sixth market in 18 months. As one of the biggest economies across Africa, our move into Kenya serves as a gateway to other East African markets. We are excited to continue our expansion, having achieved over 50 percent plus on month on month growth since launch.
“Moove recently received the IFC Corporate Award, as one of the top 20 most impactful and transformational companies in their portfolio that is applying an innovative and scalable solution towards solving a continent-wide problem. This further validates that our model is really working, in getting customers to the virtuous path of vehicle ownership, and by doing so, we are creating employment and income opportunities for these mobility entrepreneurs,” he concluded.
With the launch in Kenya, Tayo Oyegunle, chief operations officer, states, “The team and I are proud to be bringing financial inclusion to mobility entrepreneurs in Nairobi, Kenya. We’re offering flexible employment through revenue-based financing, thus empowering drivers and driving growth in Africa’s mobility industry, underlined by our commitment to ensure that 50% of our customers are female. The Uber, Sendy and Lori System partnerships will also allow us to enter the market with a substantial range of products and services for mobility entrepreneurs to take advantage of by moving people, goods and services.”
