Indian SaaS giant Zoho, the first bootstrapped Saas company to reach 100M users, is the preferred choice for tech companies in Africa. The enterprise suite of products from Zoho has been adopted over similar workplace products such as Google Workspace with cost playing a major role in this decision. 

Zoho is not only a cost-effective option for tech companies, but the company has allowed the acceptance of regional currencies, which has helped with higher adoption rates. By allowing customers to forgo limitations associated with dollar transactions, transaction processes have become smoother.  

Zoho co-founder and CEO, Sridhar Vembu, highlighted the acceptance of local currencies in Latin America too. 

Source: X

Expansion in Africa

The company has also recruited local talent to help have a strong foothold in the region.  As per a report, seven startups in Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa have adopted Zoho’s products over the past year. 

Starting operations in 2019, with two salespersons in South Africa and Nigeria, the company now has 60 employees across Africa. 

“A lot of companies are adopting digital, either for the first time or they’re on that path of making their businesses more efficient using technology,” said Praval Singh, vice president of marketing and customer experience at Zoho. 

Global and Rural Growth

The Middle East and Africa region have been the fastest growing market for Zoho with revenue contribution of close to 10% of the total global revenue. The company is also looking to actively expand in these regions by doubling hirings. 

The company is also actively expanding in Tier 2 and 3 cities in India, and recently opened an R&D facility in Kottarakara, a small town in Kerala. The first rural R&D centre was set up in another small town Tenkasi, in Tamil Nadu. 

Keeping the expansion plans alive, the company’s IT enterprise wing, ManageEngine, recently confirmed that the company has invested $10M in NVIDIA, Intel, and AMD GPUs. 

Zoho now serves over 700k businesses across 150 countries.