KAMPALA. December 1, 2014. OLX, one of the world’s leading online classified platforms, today announced its entry into the Ugandan market by unveiling it’s free portal for buying and selling unused goods and services, www.olx.co.ug.
Representing OLX’s Head of Sub Saharan Africa, Kenya’s country manager Thomas Platenga expressed his joy at the company finally being able to embark on this venture. “OLX has seen tremendous success in the countries in which we are present. Kenya is on the lead with 98% brand awareness, meaning almost everybody knows OLX and can tell you what it is about. This is the kind of response we hope and know we will get from Uganda,” he said.
Announcing the new service, Mr. Platenga remarked, “We are very happy to launch OLX Uganda today. This simply means that Ugandans can now transact their businesses online by buying and selling on-line for free.
Uganda is the third market in East Africa to launch OLX after Kenya and Tanzania. The two sister countries are experiencing a fast growth in internet penetration and usage as they adopt new ways of doing business and connecting with the world. “Today, many people are looking at conducting business in the virtual world as opposed to the physical one because of the numerous benefits the internet has brought to mankind,” Platenga added.
Mr. Platenga concluded by saying everyone should benefit from having access to basic internet tools and technology as it enables people to more easily share and connect with the community around them. “Our site in Uganda is live, and now people of Uganda can post their unused goods freely into the OLX site and get selling.”
Uganda’s internet users increased by 1.7M in June this year to 8.5 million people compared to 6.8 million users in June 2013, according to the Uganda Communications Commission (UCC).
OLX will enable Ugandans to sell and buy virtually everything legally acceptable in the country ranging from used phones, clothes, shoes, furniture, food, television sets and books through its site for free. “We have thousands of sellers and buyers on OLX who are ready to own property that is no longer useful to you and clutters your life. The idea is to create an on-line market place for sellers to meet buyers and sell their unused goods through OLX platform all for free”. he added.
Ugandans can access the free OLX app by visiting www.olx.co.ug.The service works on smart phones and feature phones.