African enterprises are changing how they conduct business thanks to digital sales and procurement platforms, which are also encouraging a more productive trading climate overall and easing frictions that have long hampered traditional supply chains.
These platforms are well-positioned to provide payment and credit services to African businesses, and they are increasingly acting as more than just middlemen between buyers and sellers.
According to Tunde Kara, CEO and co-founder of restaurant procurement platform Vendease, adding payment became necessary as the business reached a certain point in its development regarding the change from a pure marketplace to a payment processor.
The horizontal platform of payments “almost becomes unavoidable for you to grasp” when you construct your vertical sufficiently thoroughly, he claimed.
He said, “Within the first year of launch, the Vendease team realised that it would need to develop its own payment system as suppliers weren’t getting paid on time, which was delaying deliveries.
After the business entered the payments market, according to Kara, developing a buy now, pay later (BNPL) solution that allowed restaurants to make purchases on credit was a logical next step to promote industry growth. He said that with BNPL, “people have more cash to play with in terms of expanding their enterprises.”
