Jumia made headlines as the “Amazon of Africa” for much of the last decade, becoming Africa’s first tech unicorn and going public at USD 14.00 a share in 2019 before soaring past USD 50.00. But in 2025, it’s a complicated tale, exiting markets, shedding services, early backers pulling out, and its stock under USD 5.00.

Today, a surprising player is in the wings, plotting a takeover of Africa’s biggest e-commerce company, reports suggest. The suitor is Axian Telecom, the Mauritius-based telecom and fintech group, which recently raised USD 600 M in bonds and quietly amassed an 8% stake in Jumia.

With telecom, mobile money, and brands like Yas and Mixx under its umbrella, which collectively fetched USD 1.1 B in revenue and USD 55 M in profit last year, Axian aims to integrate connectivity, payments, and commerce in one system. Its bond raise, reportedly oversubscribed threefold, was marketed as digital infrastructure capital.

The takeover bid is unfolding against the backdrop of Jumia’s own pivot. CEO Francis Dufay has spent the past two years cutting back—exiting non-core markets like South Africa and Tunisia, cutting services and staff, and narrowing operations to nine key countries.

He’s moved the company from reckless expansion to consolidating fundamentals: rural distribution, pick-up stations, logistics, and stronger margins. “We must deliver the numbers. Execution will rebuild our credibility,” Dufay told the FT last month. And he’s putting a timeline on it: profitability by early 2027.

The stakes are high. Chinese platforms like Temu and Shein are muscling in, using ultra-cheap prices and slick logistics to steal share. Jumia has responded by onboarding low-cost Chinese merchants, creating a Shenzhen team of 70, and folding their offerings into the marketplace.

“We believe we can fight them,” Dufay declared, arguing Jumia’s localised approach and product breadth give it an edge.

And yet the macro still bites. Jumia has weathered multiple currency devaluations across key African markets such as Nigeria and Egypt that crushed margins. Its 2024 revenue fell 10% to USD 167.5 M, with negative EBITDA exceeding USD 54 M; Q1 2025 brought further GMV decline, though Dufay noted orders were up 21% in constant currency.

However, despite GMV growth in constant currency, quarterly active users have stayed stagnant as it struggles to find new customers, and loss-making continued—USD 20 M in Q3 2024 and over USD 18 M in Q1 this year. Although, to their credit, Dufay’s cutbacks have slashed annual losses by over USD 150 M, core profitability remains elusive.

That’s where Axian enters the frame. Telecoms have infrastructure, connectivity, customer reach—and increasingly, money. Combine that with Jumia’s logistics and distribution strength, and that adds up to a digital ecosystem capable of bundling mobile data, mobile money, and e-commerce into one consumer offering. That synergy is reminiscent of what telecoms did in Asia.

Axian CEO Hassan Jaber has framed the bond raise as a strategic “digital infrastructure” play; the acquisition talks have already lifted Jumia shares in New York. And while Dufay has bet on rural Africa’s vast potential—“Africa is the last place on earth with massive untapped demand,” as he put it recently —that demand must translate into reliable repurchase behaviour and stable margins.

Yet the cleanup is underway. Jumia’s soft-exit from unsustainable ventures, its pivot toward Chinese-supplied assortment, and a renewed focus on efficient operations have laid the groundwork. Axian stepping in now indicates infrastructure capital may just write the next chapter.