United Bank for Africa (UBA) is set to launch U-Mall, its partnership project with Netplus Advisory in other African nations in which the bank is operating. This was revealed by Wole Faroun, managing director of Netplus Advisory in an exclusive chat.
He said the bank is the party that is “leading the thinking”. According to him, when the project goes live in other African nations, it would contribute significantly to the growth of businesses.
“Our vision for U-Mall is for it to become a big ecommerce solution that helps thousands of Nigerian business and indeed African businesses grow their businesses using the online channels,” he said. He added: “We are certain that we will have U-Mall implemented in other African countries where UBA currently operates.”
On the choice of UBA as partner for the U-Mall project, he said it is bank that is innovative in ecommerce.
“They are a leading bank and they have shown innovation in e-business and e-payment solutions so it was an easy decision,” Faroun said.
He said the number of companies on the platform is increasing and the companies are from various categories. Before a business is allowed on the platform, he said certain verification procedures are undertaken.
He said: “We got over 100 businesses in the first week of launch. It’s been increasing ever since – but because of KYC involved, it takes time for the actual site to be made available to customers. The bank needs to do verification of the businesses.
It depends on the business. It’s faster for current account holders because the bank already knows them. For new acct holders it could take a couple of weeks.”