OLX launches iPad app

Online classified sites are big business these days. There’s a reason have been accused of killing the newspaper industry. Now one of the biggest of them all is making a new play in the app world.

Global classifieds giant OLX has launched a free iPad app, which it claims is a first for the South African market.

According to Simon Berger-Perrin, Vice President of Mobile at OLX, the app offers classifieds for properties, jobs, second-hand goods, pets, and more.

“We are excited to release this new universal app to address the booming iPad market,” he says. “Now iPad owners have a great free app to buy and sell everything with OLX.”

OLX SA country manager, Paul Casarin, says he is encouraged by the growth of iPad penetration in the country and excited about extending OLX’s online presence onto mobile phones and tablets:

“As more South Africans start using smart phones or touch devices, they will discover the same convenience of using OLX on mobile, that they’ve grown accustomed to on the Internet”.

“South Africans are progressively using mobile to transact and OLX already provides free classifieds services on a wide range of devices. A large part of our traffic in South Africa comes from iPad owners already. Based on the overwhelming response from our users, we’ve developed a dedicated app for the iPad which dramatically improves the overall user experience.”

Users can reportedly take photos and videos with their iPad and attach to their postings; and they can use the innovative GPS function to see all the ads around them on a map.

The app is reportedly universal, meaning that it works on both iPhones and iPads.

“The advantage for the users who own an iPhone and an iPad is that they do not need to download two different apps. Same for the updates, both iPhone and iPad apps get updated at the same time making it a convenient option for mobile users,” says Casarin.

Founded in 2006 by emerging markets super investor Fabrice Grinda, OLX is used in over 96 countries and 40 languages and has offices in Argentina, Brazil, India, China and USA. In late 2011, emerging markets internet giant Naspers made a strategic decision to dump its own classifieds service in favour of OLX.

The company also has apps available for BlackBerry, Android and Nokia.