Africa’s Top E-tailers Fight Global Rivals By Hijacking Their Playbook
South Africa’s largest e-commerce company reported its first annual operating profit in 15 years this week, a surprising achievement against the backdrop of its stiffest competition yet, which the company, like other local African players, is navigating by hijacking the very playbook with which global rivals sought to crush it.
Takealot Group swung from a USD 13 M adjusted operating loss to a USD 11 M profit in the year ended March 2026, according to parent company Naspers. The core Takealot.com platform generated USD 906 M in revenue.
The milestone comes as competition has intensified on every front. Amazon launched its South African marketplace in May 2024 and has been expanding its Prime subscription service with lower-cost delivery. Chinese discount platforms Shein and Temu are estimated to have generated around ZAR 7.3 B in sales in 2024, accounting for more than a third of South Africa’s online clothing market.
Rather than fight a price war it could not win, Takealot chose to borrow from its competitors. The company expanded its marketplace to international sellers, including merchants from China, giving shoppers access to cheaper products and a much larger catalogue.
It also leaned harder into its TakealotMORE subscription programme, which accounted for 27% of gross merchandise value during the year, and turned its logistics network into a standalone business. Takealot Fulfilment Solutions, which offers warehousing and delivery services to external merchants, recorded 93.5% year-on-year revenue growth.
The strategy mirrors moves by Jumia, another African e-commerce giant still pursuing profitability. Jumia opened an office in Yiwu, China’s sprawling wholesale capital, in December 2025.
By September, the platform counted roughly 24,000 China-based sellers and had 2.2 million China-sourced items sitting in its African warehouses. In the first quarter of 2026, the volume of items sold by international sellers on Jumia grew 87% year-on-year. The company’s revenue rose 39% to USD 50.6 M.
The trend points to a broader shift taking shape in African e-commerce, where local platforms are figuring that the battle with Chinese marketplaces may not be won by building a better marketplace, but by plugging into the same supply chains. This has fuelled something of an ironic outcome where Takealot’s best results have come amid the most intense competition it has ever faced.
