Run the world {{ FIRSTNAME | there }}? A group of researchers wanted to see how good AI would be at it, so they gave 50-agent teams a Minecraft server and told them to build the perfect civilisation. All of them failed as they fell into crippling bureaucracy and zombies killed everyone. 🤷‍♀️

PS: Did you know that today is The Open Letter’s birthday? Jip, on 3 November 2022, we sent out our first edition to about 100-or-so readers. Today we’ve showcased hundreds of businesses and unique insights/viewpoints to millions of eyes over the years, and it’s all thanks to awesome people like you. 🥳🎉🎂

PPS: Since tomorrow is the local elections, go vote — we’ll catch you again first thing on Thursday.

In This Open Letter

SA tech could always admire behemoths like Capitec from afar. But a new era is opening up, one where SA's biggest corporates are looking outward for partners.

Remember when we told you that Pepkor merging Flash and Shop2Shop was basically moving the ATM to the spaza shop? It's just one example of a larger trend: big corporates are shifting from geographical scaling to using their big customer bases to innovate and offer more value – to get a bigger share of the total wallet.

That's why we're seeing so many suddenly building in different verticals: Discovery and Old Mutual starting banks, while the banks launch MVNOs, retailers like Shoprite building ad networks and telcos (MTN and Vodacom) suddenly offering loans.

And in that game, distribution is king. And check what happens when you ask who's SA's biggest...

SA's biggest bank goes beyond banking

That plays in favour of SA's largest bank by customers, Capitec, and I don't think they've missed it. In October, its listed holding company officially changed its name from Capitec Bank Holdings to Capitec Limited, a move Capitec says reflects its growing focus on a wider range of value-adding solutions for clients.

The numbers have been telling the story for a while: Capitec's fintech businesses (Value-Added Services and Capitec Connect) contributed R2.7bn of its R9.5bn interim headline earnings, and non-interest income now makes up 70% of income from operations. Beyond core banking, Capitec offers:

Add business banking to the mix, and you've got a growing range of products and new areas where partners can add value. Which is where the exciting news comes in for those building tech ventures in SA…

The Opportunity

Capitec built its success by doing one thing exceptionally well: simple, accessible banking. That focus helped it become SA's largest bank by clients.

But as the offering expands, there's a strong case for ventures and partnerships to accelerate innovation, launch new products and unlock new markets. Good news for those building fintechs or solutions for large organisations.

And it's not only Capitec. Consolidation is happening as companies with large customer bases expand into banking and beyond:

In fact, we find this conversation so compelling that we're bringing together Andrew Hardie (CEO, Pay@), Johan Nel (Executive Head Ventures, Capitec), Lu Chopera (Deal Flow Lead, Katapult VC) and Johan Bosini (Partner, Quona Capital) to unpack what it takes to scale and exit startups in SA. It's happening on 12 November at the Homecoming Centre in Cape Town.

More than 200 tickets sold, so don't miss the chance to learn from and connect with industry peers during this exciting period in SA's innovation ecosystem.

We're watching this space…

An AI developer got tired of Claude answering his work questions in walls of text. So he built Sketchy: Claude only describes what to draw, and a layout engine delivers answers as interactive diagrams, mind maps, and sketches.

The lekker clever part:

✅ Hand-drawn style diagrams appear right in the chat
✅ Hover details and a step-by-step mode show how it all fits
✅ He built it with Claude Code, asking it to explain each part as he went

It's free and open source, as a Claude skill or a Claude Desktop extension.

What's your team building, and where are you hosting it?

Magic Safari built an AI search that understood almost any request, then replaced most of it with ordinary filters and a thin layer of AI. It went from 20 seconds to instant and became almost free to run. So we asked the founder why less AI made a better product.

And it turns out, there are 5 steps to keep AI in your product to the minimum that works.

🤝 Four in Ten on Grants. SA paid 26.6 million social grants last year, about 41% of the population, up from 25% in 2006. The numbers may finally be turning, though. And the fix that matters most isn't in the grant system.

🏕️ Data Centres, Now With a Campus Vibe. OpenAI is weighing rebranding its data centres as "AI compute campuses" to calm the backlash. A new name won't change the water bill, and Cape Town already has its own version of this fight.

🏖️ A R86.5m Beach Walk. Table View's beachfront is getting an R86.5m makeover, with a new 3km walkway due by mid-December. It's not just cosmetic, either. And Muizenberg's getting an even bigger one.

💸 Faster VC Deals. Why does preparing funding deals take so much longer in SA? Well, the US and UK are speeding it up with templated processes. So Dommisse Attorneys and SAVCA created SA's first open-source model investment documents; see more here.*

🎟️ Your attendees should be your community. The people who buy your tickets are the start of your next event. On Radi, they stay yours, with event pages that sell and sales tracking that shows what worked. Host on Radi and keep what you build.*

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

Yesterday, we featured Thrif's used clothing marketplace, asking what's really in your "I'll sell it one day" pile. Turns out, it's most of the cupboard…

🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 👗 Clothes with the tags still on, sadly (25%)

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🧥 That jacket I swear I'll wear again (8%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 📦 Half my wardrobe, waiting for a free Saturday (67%)

On 3 November 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 2, the second spacecraft ever put into Earth orbit and the first to carry a living creature: Laika, a stray doggie from the streets of Moscow.

This is where the story turns sad, though: Laika survived only a few hours out in orbit. She eventually died from stress and overheating because, as it turns out, Sputnik 2 had no way to de-orbit or re-enter.

Less than four years later, Yuri Gagarin became the first human in orbit. He came back, but Laika remains our heroine. 🐕

Beyond Survival Mode, 6 Nov, CPT: Mental health practitioner Louise Niemann on why resilience and high performance are not the same as thriving, at Innovation City. Get tickets.

Raising Local Seed Capital, 5 Nov, online: Alexandra Fraser and Cape Town founders who just closed pre-seed and seed rounds on what raising really takes. Register free.

SA to the Netherlands, 4 Nov, online: Nic Haralambous and Andy Golding on what it really takes to build a life and career there. Register free.

Powered by Radi. Want your business event in front of 36,000 The Open Letter readers? Host it on Radi, and it lands here.

🧩 Tool to Try: AskMandla handles your domestic worker's contract, UIF, payroll and monthly payslips, all through WhatsApp. From R49 a month.

🌍 That's Interesting: Sailors used to pour oil on the sea around their boats to calm storm waves, and ships had to carry "storm oil" for it until the late 20th century.