Wakami Multi-Service Marketplace
Ashish Sharma
Building a Multi-Service Marketplace and Logistics Platform
Overview
Wakami is a mobile marketplace and logistics platform designed for the Nigerian market. The platform connects customers, merchants, and delivery partners through a single application for ordering products, managing payments, coordinating deliveries, and tracking transactions.
I worked as the lead backend engineer, designing and developing the platform’s core architecture, APIs, database systems, payment workflows, administrative tools, and cloud infrastructure.
The Challenge
Wakami needed to support several interconnected user journeys within one platform:
Customers ordering products and services
Merchants receiving and approving orders
Delivery partners managing assigned tasks
Secure payments and wallet transactions
Real-time order and delivery updates
Identity verification and user onboarding
Administrative oversight and dispute handling
The platform also needed to work reliably in a market where payment failures, unstable network conditions, delayed merchant responses, and operational exceptions are common.
The main challenge was building a backend that could coordinate all these workflows while preventing duplicate payments, conflicting order updates, and inconsistent transaction records.
My Role
I was responsible for the backend architecture and much of the platform’s technical delivery.
My work included:
Designing the backend and database architecture
Building REST APIs using Node.js and NestJS
Modelling marketplace, payment, wallet, and delivery workflows
Integrating payment and identity-verification providers
Implementing authentication and role-based access
Building merchant, customer, rider, and admin functionality
Developing notification and real-time update systems
Deploying and maintaining the production infrastructure
Improving database reliability, validation, and error handling
The Solution
Multi-Role Platform Architecture
I designed the backend to support multiple user roles, including:
Customers
Merchants
Delivery partners
Administrative staff
Each role had separate permissions, workflows, and access rules.
Users could also switch between supported roles without creating disconnected accounts, while sensitive actions remained protected by role-based authorization.
Order and Marketplace Workflows
I built the core ordering system, covering the full lifecycle from cart creation to delivery completion.
The workflow included:
Product and merchant discovery
Cart creation and updates
Order submission
Merchant review and approval
Payment confirmation
Delivery assignment
Order tracking
Completion and transaction records
A time-sensitive approval system allowed merchants to review incoming carts before the transaction progressed. The backend handled expiry, rejection, cancellation, and retry scenarios to prevent orders from becoming stuck in invalid states.
Payments and Wallet Infrastructure
I integrated payment providers for account verification, customer payments, merchant transactions, and wallet-related operations.
The payment layer included:
Payment initialization
Account resolution
Transaction verification
Webhook processing
Payment status tracking
Wallet balance updates
Merchant settlement records
Proof-of-purchase handling
Webhook and transaction operations were designed to be idempotent so repeated provider callbacks would not create duplicate payments or balance changes.
I also implemented database safeguards to prevent multiple active payment records from being created for the same task and merchant combination.
Identity Verification and Account Security
The platform required reliable onboarding and identity checks for different user types.
I worked on integrations with identity-verification providers for:
Identity document checks
Facial and liveness verification
Address verification
Know Your Customer workflows
I also implemented account security features such as:
OTP-based authentication
Four-digit transaction PINs
Secure PIN hashing
Email and phone-number change verification
Role-based permissions
Account deletion workflows
Delivery and Task Management
I developed backend functionality for assigning and managing delivery tasks.
The system supported:
Delivery task creation
Rider assignment
Task acceptance and rejection
Status tracking
Proof of delivery
Order completion
Transaction history
The data model was designed to keep order, payment, merchant, and delivery records synchronized throughout the transaction lifecycle.
Notifications and Communication
I built notification workflows for important events such as:
New orders
Merchant approvals
Payment updates
Rider assignments
Delivery status changes
Account and security actions
The platform also included chat functionality to support communication between users involved in an order.
User-Focused Product Features
I implemented several features designed to improve completion rates and reduce user friction, including:
Draft and resume functionality
Budget calculation
Proof of purchase
Referral tracking
Saved progress
Role switching
Account deletion with a recovery period
Live cart and approval updates
These features allowed users to continue incomplete actions without restarting and gave the operations team more visibility into platform activity.
Admin and Operational Tools
I built APIs and backend functionality for the administrative dashboard.
The admin system enabled internal teams to:
Review users and accounts
Manage merchants
Monitor transactions
Review identity-verification results
Track orders and delivery tasks
Handle failed payments
Manage administrative staff
Investigate operational issues
This reduced the need for manual database intervention and gave the operations team direct control over common platform workflows.
Infrastructure and Deployment
I deployed and maintained the backend using AWS infrastructure.
The production environment included:
Amazon EC2
Amazon RDS for PostgreSQL
PM2 process management
Secure database connections
Environment-based configuration
Logging and monitoring
Automated deployment workflows
I also handled database migrations, production troubleshooting, indexing, server maintenance, and infrastructure-level reliability improvements.
Results
The project delivered:
A production-ready multi-role marketplace platform
Customer, merchant, delivery, and admin workflows
Secure payment and wallet infrastructure
Identity-verification integrations
Reliable order and delivery lifecycle management
Real-time notifications and communication
Protected transaction and account actions
Administrative tools for operational management
A scalable backend foundation for future growth
The resulting system connected marketplace ordering, payments, logistics, identity verification, and administration within a single backend architecture.
Technology Stack
Node.js, TypeScript, NestJS, PostgreSQL, Prisma, React Native, Expo, React, AWS EC2, Amazon RDS, PM2, Paystack, HitchPay, Dojah, Smile ID, REST APIs, Webhooks, OTP Authentication, Role-Based Access Control, and Push Notifications.
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Posted Jul 12, 2026
Developed backend for Wakami's multi-role marketplace and logistics platform in Nigeria.
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Timeline
Dec 1, 2025 - Jun 30, 2026
Clients
Wakami
