Amazon.com, which has had a support presence in South Africa since 2006, is set to move into new offices in Cape Town signalling continued expansion in the country.

Although the online retail giant does NOT have a retail presence in South Africa, it has been rapidly expanding its support network, tied to its Amazon EC2 (Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud) services, according to a story on businesstech.co.za. In 2012, the company opened a customer support centre in Cape Town.

And as of February 2018, the group lists as many as 56 job openings available in Cape Town.

Speaking to eProp.co.za, Chad Shapiro – senior commercial broker for Lew Geffen Sotheby’s International Realty in the CBD, City Bowl and Atlantic Seaboard – confirmed that Amazon.com’s new local offices would be located on Roeland Street in the city.

Shapiro said that the internet giant’s offices will be located in a new purpose built office where Viglietti Motors was previously situated. Scuderia House is currently under development by NMC Construction Group.

Development on the building began in January 2017, with build time projected at 13 months – meaning a completion date for February 2018. However, the project has been delayed, with NMC entering into business rescue in the latter part of 2017.

Upon completion, Scuderia House will include five basement parking levels, one parking level above ground and seven commercial levels to be occupied by Amazon.

The building is located around the corner from where Amazon’s Development Centre is currently situated.

In South Africa, Takealot is already the leading online retailer, which has promised to invest in its own digital download services.

For Amazon, the simplest way to get its huge range of products and services online in other countries has been to purchase the leading retailer. Last year Amazon purchased the Middle East’s biggest online retailer Souq.com for an undisclosed sum, which gave the US retail giant access to the wealthy GCC market.

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