The verdict in three sentences
For a parts importer serving 2,000 garages with 25,000 part numbers, a profitable B2B platform costs 30 to 70 million FCFA excl. VAT (about 46,000 to 107,000 EUR, or 50,000 to 116,000 USD) and ships in 5 to 6 months. Success depends less on design than on reliable vehicle search (plate, VIN, OE reference through TecDoc), because a mechanic who receives the wrong brake pad does not come back. The second lever is financial: per-customer trade credit, payment by mobile wallet, card or cash on delivery, and segment pricing, otherwise your sales reps will keep taking orders by phone. The benchmark below comes from an Abidjan project; a Dubai distributor with the same scope lands in a comparable range in USD, with card and bank transfer replacing Wave and Orange Money.
What each building block costs in 2026
The budget is driven mainly by catalogue depth and ERP integration (Sage, Odoo, SAP Business One). Here is a 2026 ballpark, excluding the TecDoc licence.
| Building block | Range FCFA excl. VAT | Indicative timeline |
|---|---|---|
| Scoping, workshops with garages and reps | 2,000,000 - 4,000,000 | 3-4 weeks |
| 25,000-reference catalogue + TecDoc import | 6,000,000 - 14,000,000 | 6-8 weeks |
| Search by plate, VIN and OE reference | 4,000,000 - 10,000,000 | 4-6 weeks |
| Segment pricing, discounts and trade credit | 4,000,000 - 9,000,000 | 4-5 weeks |
| Wave, Orange Money, cash on delivery | 2,500,000 - 5,000,000 | 3-4 weeks |
| ERP sync for stock and invoices | 5,000,000 - 13,000,000 | 6-8 weeks |
| Sales rep mobile app (order taking, offline) | 5,000,000 - 12,000,000 | 6-8 weeks |
| Testing, training, go-live | 1,500,000 - 3,000,000 | 3 weeks |
The low end (30 million FCFA) means a catalogue without a native sales app and hourly file-based ERP sync. The high end (70 million FCFA) includes the offline app, a real-time ERP API and a typo-tolerant search engine. On the recurring side, budget the TecDoc licence, hosting and application maintenance, roughly 8 to 15% of the initial budget per year as an estimate.
The catalogue: TecDoc, plates and cross-references
A mechanic looks for a part in three ways: by vehicle model, by the OE number stamped on the worn part, or by the customer's registration document. Your platform must cover all three.
| Search mode | Observed share among garages | Technical complexity | Impact on returns |
|---|---|---|---|
| Make, model, engine | 45-55% of searches | Medium (TecDoc tree) | Cuts errors by 30-40% |
| OE manufacturer reference | 25-35% | Low with clean cross-references | Very strong on engine parts |
| Plate or VIN | 10-20% | High (VIN decoding, incomplete local data) | Most reliable when data exists |
| Free text ('Corolla 2012 brake pad') | 15-25% | Medium (typo-tolerant engine) | Variable |
| Barcode scan of the worn part | 5-10% | Low on the app side | Useful at the counter |
In Côte d'Ivoire, as in the Gulf, a large share of the fleet is imported used, and plate-to-exact-model mappings are incomplete, so VIN decoding is more reliable than the plate. Plan for data cleaning too: out of 25,000 references, 15 to 25% usually need label or cross-reference fixes before going live.
Segment pricing, trade credit and payment methods
Your 2,000 garages do not pay the same price. An authorised workshop ordering 8 million FCFA per month does not get the terms of a neighbourhood mechanic. After login, the platform must show the customer's net price, approved credit line and balance.
| Customer segment | Typical discount on list price | Indicative credit limit | Preferred payment |
|---|---|---|---|
| Authorised garages and dealers | 18-25% | 5,000,000 - 20,000,000 FCFA at 30 days | Transfer, trade credit |
| Corporate fleets and hauliers | 15-22% | 3,000,000 - 15,000,000 FCFA at 45 days | Transfer |
| Regular independent garages | 10-15% | 500,000 - 3,000,000 FCFA at 15 days | Wave, Orange Money |
| Neighbourhood mechanics | 5-8% | No credit | Wave, Orange Money, cash on delivery |
| Upcountry resellers | 12-18% | 2,000,000 - 8,000,000 FCFA | Mixed |
Cash on delivery is still common but expensive: returns, drivers carrying cash, manual reconciliation. A good 2026 practice is to offer mobile money at checkout with a small discount (1 to 2%) to move small garages to digital payment.
Mini case study
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Mr Kouassi runs a parts importer in Abidjan: 2,000 garage customers, 6 sales reps, monthly revenue of 900 million FCFA. Today 70% of orders arrive by phone and WhatsApp, with a 6% wrong-part rate. Each error costs about 18,000 FCFA (return, transport, rep time), so across 7,000 monthly orders roughly 7.5 million FCFA per month.
With a 48 million FCFA platform and a cautious target of 50% of orders online with errors down to 2% on that channel, savings reach about 2.8 million FCFA per month on errors alone. Add 2 reps freed from data entry and redeployed to prospecting, and payback lands around 12 to 16 months, as an estimate.
FAQ
Is a TecDoc licence mandatory?
No, but without vehicle cross-reference data, model search stays approximate. For 25,000 references the licence usually pays off if it prevents more than 2 to 3% of ordering errors.
How long to put 25,000 references online?
Allow 6 to 8 weeks of import and cleaning alongside development. The 3,000 references that make 80% of sales must be clean first.
How is trade credit handled online?
The platform reads the outstanding balance from the ERP and blocks the order above the limit, or routes it for approval. This module represents 4 to 9 million FCFA depending on rule complexity.
Are mobile wallets enough for B2B orders?
They handle baskets up to a few million FCFA well, depending on your merchant account limits. Above that, bank transfer and trade credit remain the norm.
Will sales reps lose their customers?
Not if the app credits them with orders from their portfolio. In most projects they go from 60% of time on data entry to under 20%.
Let's scope your project. Send us your reference count, your ERP and your customer segments, and we will price an auto parts B2B platform between 30 and 70 million FCFA with a 5 to 6 month plan. Detailed quote within 48 h. WhatsApp +221 77 596 93 33.
Mohamed Bah
Fondateur, Kolonell
Passionate about digital and entrepreneurship in Africa, Mohamed has been helping Sénégalese businesses with their digital transformation since 2020. Founder of Kolonell, he believes every SME deserves a professional and accessible online présence.
