TL;DR: FuelBuddy evaluated Zimbabwe, Zambia and Nigeria, and launched in Zimbabwe first. From April 2025 I built a B2B bulk and wholesale fuel business there from zero: around 15 suppliers signed in month one, including global commodity traders and the national oil company on USD settlement, 50+ enterprise and regional clients won from a 400+ network, and a live B2B business with 8 active depots and zero stock-outs. 40+ discovery interviews fed the product backlog. I was promoted to Country Head and Product Manager in May 2026.

Market entry · Product Manager, then Country Head and Product Manager · Live business

The problem

Entering a new country with a fuel business means solving supply, credit and operations before there is a single customer. There was no local team, no supplier base, no banking set-up and no customer list. Product work had to start alongside the business, not after it: the platforms built in India (the Vendor Management System and the Fuel Management System) only matter if they fit how fuel is actually bought and moved in the new market.

Evidence

• Market selection: Zimbabwe, Zambia and Nigeria were all evaluated before launch.
• Discovery: 40+ interviews with customers, transporters and fleet operators. Their answers went straight into the product backlog.
• Network: a working network of 400+ customers, transporters and fleet operators, which is where the 50+ enterprise and regional clients came from.

How it works

flowchart LR
	A["Evaluate markets<br>(Zimbabwe, Zambia, Nigeria)"] --> B["Launch Zimbabwe<br>Apr 2025"]
	B --> C["Operations under SOPs:<br>banking, procurement,<br>credit, dispatch, reporting"]
	C --> D["~15 suppliers<br>signed in month one"]
	D --> E["B2B bulk and<br>wholesale customers"]
	E --> F["40+ discovery<br>interviews"]
	F --> G["Product backlog:<br>FMS and VMS"]
	G --> H["Requirements for<br>Zambia and Nigeria"]

Market selection. The three markets were compared on the things that decide whether a fuel business can run at all: supplier access, credit risk and the regulatory path. Zimbabwe launched first; the other two became expansion candidates.

Operations under written SOPs. Banking, procurement, credit, dispatch and reporting were each set up with written standard operating procedures, so the business could run the same way whoever was on shift, and so the data it produced could feed the product later.

Discovery into the backlog. The 40+ interviews were not a one-off study. What customers and transporters said about ordering, credit and delivery went into the FuelBuddy product backlog, and today I set local release priorities for the FMS and VMS from depot and customer feedback, within the central roadmap owned in India.

Team. I lead an eight-person local team and coordinate 50+ colleagues across Mozambique, Zambia, the UAE and India. The business has onboarded 50+ enterprise and regional clients.

Decisions and trade-offs

• One market first, not three. Launching only Zimbabwe kept the team and capital focused, at the cost of slower regional coverage. Zambia and Nigeria are now being prepared on the back of what Zimbabwe taught us.
• Write the SOPs before scaling. Slower in the first weeks, but it gave the business a repeatable way to run credit and dispatch and made reporting trustworthy.
• Pause the on-site FMS for a large enterprise client. The deployment was scoped, then paused pending hardware sourcing and payment-integration gaps. Going live without reliable hardware or a working payment flow would have produced bad data and a poor first reference in the market.
• Measure volume and depots, not activity. The North Star metrics are monthly volume transacted and active depots, because those track whether customers keep buying.

What I cut