Like the cold {{ FIRSTNAME }}? This video of how engineers keep an Antarctic base from sinking into the snow is one of the coolest things you’ll see today. Can you even imagine contending with melting ice sheets? 😳

In Today’s Open Letter

Internationals want SA talent but struggle to manage vetting – so this local startup’s looking to boost SA talent exports…

South Africa is exporting skills at scale. In 2023, the BPO sector created more than 19’000 new jobs and generated $309 million (R5.2 billion) in export revenue for offshore clients.

For overseas companies, a rand cost base with dollar revenue looks great, and South African pros love earning in hard currency.

Employers want the agility and affordability offered by the “flexible global-talent pool”, and SA is emerging as a leading outsourcing hub, with many firms abroad preferring English-speaking teams with time-zone proximity. 

(We’ve long said SA is the centre of the universe)...

The hard part, though, is finding and vetting the right people.

The local startup creating opportunities

Traditional recruitment pipelines often feel slow or mismatched, and that’s exactly where today’s featured startup, Funti3r, saw a gap...

They’re an on-demand growth-team service connecting local and international businesses with vetted remote professionals and embedding them in client operations. 

They’re not just supplying freelancers, though. They build custom teams tailored to each company’s growth needs, whether sales support, marketing, technical operations or project management. 

Adding to the bottom line

We recently chatted with Funti3r founder Wisani Hlangwane, and he told us they’re honing in on growth operations for startups and SMEs, plugging teams into a client’s existing workflow, managing talent, KPIs and delivery end-to-end. 

With a talent pool of between 300 and 400 growth-ops pros, and their Forge AI tool that diagnoses a company’s GTM health, Funti3r gives companies flexibility without the uncertainty of recruiting full-time headcount, and offers South African professionals a bridge into real, ongoing projects, rather than one-off gigs.

Funti3r was also selected to participate in the 2025 Google for Startups Accelerator.

Can a platform like Funti3r reduce friction fast enough for both client and talent and deliver consistent quality without sacrificing flexibility? 

We’re watching this space…

You’re gonna wish you invented the Pixar version of Alexa: Ongo is a desk lamp with personality, memory and emotional intelligence, built with help from the Toy Story creators. Check it out here.

Need more control in AI video? Kling O1 lets you generate, edit, restyle and stitch scenes, plus reuse characters without redrawing. Try it here.

Tired of being locked into one model? Magai lets you switch between 50+ AI models mid-convo, all in one interface, one subscription. See it here.

Payroll isn’t just admin; it’s the foundation of trust, accuracy and growth. 

Yet for most African companies, it’s still the weakest link.

Deel Local Payroll unifies HR, payroll and finance across every country you operate in:

✅ One source of truth, no conflicting headcounts.
✅ Compliance, tax and multi-currency complexity are automated.
✅ Real-time data and integrations that keep payroll running.

As Deel Local Payroll’s Heinrich Swanepoel puts it: “If you fix payroll, you don’t just fix the back office. You fix trust and the employee experience at scale.”

Built with PaySpace and trusted by teams in 42 countries, Deel Local Payroll is the cloud-native system designed for Africa’s most complex operations.

🐮 Bet The Farm. SA AgriTech SwiftVEE has closed a R173 million Series A funding round led by HAVAÍC and Exeo Capital. The funding will go towards supporting its expansion into financial services, alongside its core marketplace. Nicely done.

🛵 Take a lot of Stuff Now. Takealot has expanded its on-demand delivery service, TakealotNow, directly into the Takealot App, with the pilot only available in Cape Town, Johannesburg, and Pretoria (for now). Lekker.

🤖 AWS Unleashes Its Code Bot. Amazon Web Services has revealed three new AI agents they’re calling “frontier agents” that can handle different tasks, like writing code, security processes and automating DevOps tasks. Most notable is its “Kiro autonomous agent” that can code on its own for days at a time. What can go wrong?

🧂 Happy Birthday, Salt. The Southern African Large Telescope (Salt) near Sutherland just turned 20. The largest optical telescope in the southern hemisphere has been busy over its 2 decades, from discovering planets outside our solar system to understanding the unusual physics around black holes. Nice one.

✅ The Stack. Founders need reliable tools, so our Founder’s Stack gives you cloud services by Cloud on Demand, Africa-ready payroll & HR via Deel Local Payroll powered by PaySpace and loads more.

Every time you share The Open Letter, the stars shine a little brighter (and we give you cool stuff, too.)

Yesterday, we showed you Sonke Retail’s automated FMCG refills, asking about the real monthly food budget killer. For most, it’s running out before month end…

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🛒 Paying a higher price per unit with small packs (12%)

🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💸 Not being able to afford bulk (16%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🥫 Running out mid-month, having to top up at high prices (36%)

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ 📉 A minimum wage that doesn’t cover the basics (28%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🔁 The cycle of “small today, expensive tomorrow” (8%)

Your 2 cents…

True dat, Johann, and then it’s frowned upon to charge entry fees for a weekend braai. 🍗

SA’s metros are starving businesses — with invoice payments taking up to 318 days.

The Auditor General’s latest report reveals the true cash flow crisis behind municipal procurement:

💡 Not one of SA’s eight metros pays invoices within the expected 30-day window.

💡 Mangaung and Johannesburg are the worst performers, taking an average of 318 and 311 days to pay suppliers.

💡 Even the best metros, Cape Town and eThekwini, still average 68 and 77 days, more than double the target.

That’s nearly 10 months of waiting for payment in some cities. For small service providers, it’s not just late, it’s unsustainable.

💡 Tool to Try: BeFreed turns books and knowledge sources into personalised audio so you can learn hands-free.

🎄 That’s Interesting: Mariah Carey still earns roughly $2.7–3.3 million every year from “All I Want for Christmas Is You” (written 31 years ago).

🏎️ Next Level: This guy built a full Mario Kart race with LEGO at home (game quirks and all).

🌍 Hack: Check out this map of Africa’s millionaire population by country.

🔨 Wow Site: Auctionizer lets you run private auctions for free; no account, no hassle.

Vote in the poll, leave a quick comment, or hit reply — we read every single one.