End of an era? We were shocked when AOL announced on Monday that it was finally shutting down dial-up internet in the US. “What year is it again?” we asked ourselves, too. But yeah, turns out 3% of Americans still had dial-up. No idea how many in SA still do, but it was 5% about 10 years ago, and SA’s already thinking of sunsetting ADSL real soon. ✂️

In This Open Letter

SA’s 3 million MSMEs are waiting ages to get paid because they’re sending invoices late – this startup’s out to change all that…

Late payments are a slow bleed for South African small businesses.

91% of local SMEs are being paid late, with invoices averaging 18 days overdue. Nearly half say cash-flow pressure is their single biggest threat. And here’s the kicker: Almost three-quarters of those who run short dip into personal funds just to keep the lights on. Not to mention the time spent chasing up payments.

The Opportunity

SA’s 3 million Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises employ around 13.4 million South Africans, roughly 4 or 5 peeps per business. And late-payments culture isn’t just bad manners. It’s actively killing growth, with many businesses employing staff unable to survive a cash shortfall for more than one pay cycle.

International research shows that on-time payment is directly linked to how quickly you get that invoice out. So, a smart move for every SME owner to send the invoice as fast as possible. 

The problem is that for many tradespeople, creating an invoice typically waits until they get home later that evening to their computer – if they even remember to invoice at all.

Want to boost the SME sector? Start with the simplest fix right in front of us: Get the invoice out before you’ve even left the job site.

The startup helping you get paid before you even hit the highway

CmdSharp is an AI voice-powered invoicing platform that lets SMEs, freelancers, tradespeople and other entrepreneurs and business owners generate and send invoices from the driver's seat of their bakkie.

CmdSharp’s answer is simple: Open the app, say "Invoice John for repairs R200" or type I @john #repairs R200, and within 11 seconds, a branded invoice is ready to send via WhatsApp, getting the bill in front of the client before they’ve even had a chance to close the gate behind you. It can also convert to a few different currencies, with the US dollar as the default for an international market.

Built in Flutter for Android, iOS and desktop, it handles quotes, short commands, a training mode for onboarding and a full dashboard with sales and payment tracking.

We caught up with CmdSharp founder Wouter Olwagen, who says the idea came from his electrician brother, who’d finish a job, head home, send the invoice hours later and sometimes never see the money. 

In a market where 18 days late is considered “normal,” CmdSharp is betting that the real competitive edge isn’t a bigger marketing budget or cheaper rates, it’s the speed of the send. 

We’re watching this space.

Automate it all! ICYMI, Renier joined Lula’s Head of Engineering, John Dalton, last week to showcase some of the automations we use in our newsletter workflow. There is also a live build demo of how to create an automated proposal creator. It takes your meeting notes with a client and converts them into a templated PDF proposal, which then gets emailed to your client. Watch the recording here.

Manual desktop steps slowing your ops? Simular Pro automates complex Mac workflows by controlling the UI like a human — clicking buttons, filling spreadsheets, and navigating legacy software — so you can scale processes without waiting for APIs. Mac-only for now. Try it here.

Turning long YouTube research into briefs? YouTube to Doc extracts key points, timestamps and quotes into a clean, shareable document, with the video and instant transcript attached, AI lecture and conversion into formats and languages baked in — useful for competitive analysis, SOPs and meeting packs. Convert a video here.

In a market defined by rapid shifts in technology and tightening budget cycles, businesses are re-evaluating how they procure their IT infrastructure.

For many, the answer isn’t ownership — it’s access. And increasingly, that access is coming through flexible finance and rental models designed to keep companies agile, productive, and cashflow resilient.

Digicape, an Apple Premium Reseller and member of the Apple Consultants Network, is helping organisations rethink their approach to tech investment through structured leasing and financial solutions that deliver the power of Mac, without the burden of capital outlay.

Want Macs right now without money on the barrel? Check out Digicape’s business solutions and custom finance options.

🎉 Tourism’s Digital Boom. SA's new digital visa system is pulling in crowds and jobs, with 25’000 tourists and nearly 2’000 jobs created in just six months. Home Affairs is doubling down and expanding the initiative to China and India. Nice one.

🤖 GPT-5 backlash. After a lot of hype, fans didn’t like that GPT-5 (an OK-performer) was a quiet sunset of everyone’s favourite, GPT-4o. The internet lashed out and, 24 hours in, Altman said paid users could use 4o again. Bumpy launch: Seems OpenAI is feeling the pressure of not being the frontrunner by such a margin anymore.

🚢 EU Goods Detour. Shipping giant Maersk halts direct service between South Africa and the US, opting for a European detour instead, spelling longer waits and higher costs for SA exporters. Goodness gracious.

🧈 Smooth like…? Savor, a startup backed by Bill Gates, is making “butter” from carbon, hydrogen and oxygen, no cows needed! Expect it on shelves in 2027. What are we gonna do with cows, though?

📦 SA’s Semigration Twist. Cape Town to Joburg is now the third most popular SA semigration route, with 25% of movers trading the Mother City for better job prospects and cheaper living costs. Or, to avoid all the incoming Jozi boets? (It's jokes, guys).

✅ The Stack. Founders need reliable tools and suppliers. That’s why our Founder’s Stack gives you real-time AI insights and decision automation from Sidekicklab, zero-monthly-fee bank accounts and business loans in 4 minutes from Lula, plus loads more vital startup tools & services.

Yesterday, we let experience Nineteen58’s unbelievably human-sounding call centre AI, asking if you could tell it was automated. And most say they’re not quite sure…

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ 🕵️ Yes – the voice was a dead giveaway (21%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🤷 Not sure – but something felt… off (32%)

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ 🎭 Nope – totally fooled me (26%)

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ 🤖 Wait… that wasn’t a real person?! (21%)

Your 2 cents…

He he, indeed, Wickfords, gotta build in a “stop to take a breath” function for it. 👾

Ja, Rob, that accent almost had us singing the national anthem first time we heard it. 🇿🇦

Eish, Hex, yeah, that part where she slows down gave us goosebumps. 🤯

Inspired by Alexander Graham Bell’s first phone call the year before (March 10, 1876), Thomas Edison reportedly researched ways to play back recorded telegraph messages via Bell’s “telephone”, when on 12 August 1877, he invented the phonograph — you know, the gramophone that would later inspire the turntable.

He kept his invention secret until around November that year, only filing for a patent in December. Naturally, it caused a stir, and by 1890, record companies had figured out how to record artists’ music and mass produce it for sale. Safe to say the world was never the same again.

🛠 Tool to Try: Workbench adds ultra-low-latency, Retina-sharp two-way screen sharing (shared cursors, stylus, gestures) so design/dev pairs can truly work side-by-side online.

🤔 That’s Interesting: Tourists toss €3’000 in coins into Rome’s Trevi Fountain per day — that’s 62k/day, R31m/year.

🔥 Next Level: This guy flip-tossing red-hot steel rods into a tiny hole, on repeat — ridiculous precision.

🍔 Hack: Higher pay isn’t about grinding harder — it’s about rare, in-demand skills; build scarce value, get paid more.

🌐 Wow Site: Historical Tech Tree is a clickable, time-calibrated map of major tech discoveries from the Stone Age to today.

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