The logistics and mobility sector accounted for 11.4 percent of the total funds raised by African startups, making it the second-highest after FinTechs.
This is even as the sector is experiencing a boom like never before, with mobility companies solving key challenges in the transportation value chain.
In the past year, there have been innovative trends centering around ease of access through e-hailing, credit facilitation to driver-partners, inter/intra-city ride-sharing, digital infrastructure for operators and overall convenience for users.
Yet, with the proliferation of ride-hailing and logistics services that attempt to solve these key issues, mobility companies have yet to scratch the surface.
Wycliffe Omondi, Co-founder of BuuPass a provider of a holistic solution to both operators and end users in the mobility ecosystem, says despite these developments the market is hyper-fragmented and broken.
“This means that a single intercity bus operator with an average of 30 buses and 20 bus stops has its operator using pen and paper to manage their operations, hence causing cash leakage and a bad customer experience,” says Omondi.
He adds that the BuuPass web platform enables long-distance transport operators to digitize and manage their services, inventory and sales, minimize cash leakages, and run seamless online bookings through its Bus Management System (BMS).
Everyday t is estimated that over 30 million people in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) travel from one city to another and over $40 billion (Sh4.9 trillion) are spent every year on domestic travel and transport.
However, despite attracting increased funding a combination of other challenges exists that hinder the mobility landscape from reaching its true potential.
The challenges, urban congestion, insufficient data on routes, unregulated public transit agencies and most importantly, the unavailability of robust end-to-end digital infrastructure management for operators.
The trucking industry, on the other hand, has only a one percent penetration rate in financing — despite its cash-intensive model that often requires some form of prepayment to take care of fuel, insurance and driver logistics.
Efforts to digitize the trucking industry have been underway as new private sector players emerge to solve different aspects of the supply chain.
The digitization efforts are geared towards increasing the visibility of the supply chain where e-logistics start-ups work to bring the different parties involved online through platforms that facilitate a wider view of different processes.
“Yet, digitising mobility across Africa wouldn’t be a walk in the park, given the continent’s regional complexities,” Says Sonia Kabra the other co-founder of BuuPass
As a mobility service provider, BuuPass aggregates key information, ranging from data, including location, time, and price, relevant for travellers and authorities to execute regulatory functions.
