All at once {{ FIRSTNAME | there }}? A startup called Max Space has designed a 4-person space station that can be delivered to orbit in one launch (no assembly required). It's already booked on a Falcon 9 launch in 2029. Woah. 🚀

In Today's Open Letter

Fewer than 5% of SA small businesses can access credit (even though 70% of the time it's for less than R1 million), so this local founder's built the balance-sheet tool to get them bankable…

The plumber has 7 bakkies, three teams and a standby crew that can reach your flooded kitchen within an hour. What he doesn't have is a balance sheet.

So when he walks into the bank for an overdraft to buy the 8th bakkie, the answer is no. Not because his business is weak, but because he can't produce paperwork he was never taught to produce.

The big finance translation gap

See, in any business, we speak and think in quotes, invoices, receipts and stock. But prepping the same info for a financial institution, you need a finance person to translate it into their language: trial balance, income statement, balance sheet, etc.

Local founder Kate Erasmus knows all about this: She's an accountant who happens to be very good at Excel, which is why, years ago, a colleague dared her to build a working accounting program inside it. She did it using macros (automation scripts) and later in Google Sheets by teaching herself Apps Script.

But then she parked the whole thing. Until a personal tragedy: Her partner passed away last year, leading Kate into a time of reflection about what she really wanted to do. It brought her full circle to the one project she'd once set aside…

The app that turns everyday quotes into a bank-ready balance sheet

AccountGo is a full accounting system that lives entirely offline on a user's phone, built for tradespeople like plumbers, electricians, garage-door guys and more.

Quote a customer on site, turn an accepted quote into an invoice with a single tap, and it's on their WhatsApp before you've pulled out of the driveway. Plus, users work in the language they know; the app translates it into the banks' language for you.

And, get this: When we asked Kate what's on the roadmap, she said nothing, on purpose. See, the day you outgrow AccountGo, you export your ledger straight to Excel and move to a subscription-based accounting software. She isn't trying to lock in the business; it's a once-off R189,99 tool the business is meant to outgrow.

What we like about it: The fact that it's offline and private means no cloud, no data mining, no lockout over a missed payment, which really serves tradespeople. It's still early days, but Kate says she's seeing installs.

We're watching this space…

If you run anything in Western Cape tourism (bookings, marketing, a guesthouse, a tour outfit) and your customer data still lives in your head and a spreadsheet, there's a free half-day in Stellenbosch with your name on it.

On 6 October, DEDAT is hosting the Tourism Tech Talk at the SU LaunchLab. It's the tech side of running a tourism business: AI, automation, digital marketing tools and what to actually do with the customer data you're already sitting on.

The line-up is why we're flagging it: Theresa Emerick founded NightsBridge, the booking system most SA guesthouses run on. Taubie Motlhabane is CEO of the CTICC. Natalia Rosa founded Big Ambitions. And the panel is all operators, not consultants: Karyn Cooper (Apex Shark Expeditions), Nick Mills (Namola), Buntu Matole (ABCD Concepts), and Paul Khambule (Amazink).

It’s free, but there are only 40 seats available.

Two SA sisters risked everything on New York. They sold their phones to showcase their recycled woven baskets and came back broke and with no orders. During lockdown, they cold-emailed US buyers a catalogue (a trick they picked up in NY) and got their product into Crate & Barrel and Target. Today, they have 380 staff and are in 15 countries. Read their story.

32% of companies cancelled software purchases to build internally instead. 1'719 leaders across 97 countries say coding agents made an in-house build realistic. Check your next three SaaS renewals. What would it cost to build solutions instead?

Capitec stopped R699 million in fraud by asking its own clients. They protected 113'410 customers from fraud in a single year by scoring the beneficiary before any EFT leaves your account, for anyone who flagged the same recipient. Your business needs this protection, too. See how it works for you.

🔓 One Breach, Four Companies. EasyEquities, Cell C, Bidvest Bank and Peregrine all warned customers of a data incident within hours of each other. They weren’t attacked, though; it was the FICA provider they all share.

📈 SA Exits Actually Pay. Turns out local venture returns sit right alongside the US, UK and Europe, and two new funds just launched on the strength of it. The useful bit isn't the multiple; it's what the exited companies had in common.

📷 A R5.1bn Acquihire. OpenAI just paid roughly ten times what a camera startup had ever raised, for two engineers and no product. It says something specific about which teams are getting bought right now.

🪪 The Green ID Book Is Dying. Home Affairs says it'll be unusable within two years, leaving the smart card as the only proof that works for FICA. If your business keeps green ID copies on file, that's a quiet deadline.

🎯 Leads Unlocked. Former Springbok Bob Skinstad has the presence but not the time to build LinkedIn. So FDC turned his profile into a lead engine that's driven 33.5 million impressions, 70k+ new followers and at least 2 quality business leads per month.*

* From our partners. Find all the best service providers for your business in our Founder Stack.

We featured SA's under-16 device gap and asked at what age you got your first phone. And most here say a landline shared with the whole family…

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 📞 A landline shared with the whole family, and I liked it (65%)

🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 📱 Primary school, and my brain has never recovered (24%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🧓 So late that my kids will never let me forget it (12%)

Yes, yes, our home market feels too small for certain things, and everyone says to have an expansion plan. But we asked an SA founder building in EVs, who looked at the numbers and decided the opposite, how he made the call.

And it turns out, there are 4 specific questions to decide whether to expand or go deeper before you spend a fortune crossing a border.

Building physical or consumer tech? The Next Wave Fund from Kickstarter and Google offers a $10k pledge toward your crowdfunding goal, expert campaign support and free Google training. Closes 30 Sep. Apply now.

Edtech team with a concept, not yet built? Injini's AI for Education Venture Builder takes 12 Southern African teams through an 8-month build, with $25k equity-free for five. Closes 27 Sep. Apply now.

Need more than just advice? The Founder Collab bundles R40k+ in tools, cloud credits, legal sessions and a curated founder community into one membership for SA tech builders. Join now.

Want free AI skills training? Google Hustle Academy 2026 offers one-day bootcamps and 60-min webinars for SA entrepreneurs and SME owners. Register for free.

SA small business ready for the national stage? NSBC Small Business Awards are open; free entry for NSBC Platinum Members across 4 categories, including Startup Champion of the Year. Gala on 12 November. See details.

Want to promote your event/programme here? Let us know.

🧩 Tool to Try: Giraffe keeps a record of all the decisions, current facts and open questions from your AI-assisted work organised by project.

🧠 That's Interesting: Solomon's paradox says people will give reasonable advice to others but fail to apply it to their own lives. The only fix is self-distancing: viewing your own problems through someone else's eyes. Explains a lot, doesn't it?