Robot army {{ FIRSTNAME | there }}? A hobby coder accidentally hacked into almost all the robot vacuums in the world. He was trying to control his vacuum with a PS5 controller, but thousands of robo-cleaners in 24 different countries started responding. 🫣

PS: Did you see our community platform is live? Yes, we have 120+ SA business owners and builders who constantly connect, learn from and help each other succeed in The Founder Collab. And now we have a remarkable new community portal with cool features like seeing who everyone is, what they’re working on, and accessing 36+ hours of business-building courses, plus unlocking the R40k worth of business services and tools that come free with your membership. Check it out…

In Today’s Open Letter

Bad hires are super costly and the LinkedIn vortex isn’t helping – but this new SA platform just might make hiring and applying for jobs a real pleasure…

The real cost of a single bad hire can come with a hefty price tag: R573’384-ish, once you factor in advertising, vetting and onboarding, wasted investment (in the person being replaced), severance and re-hiring costs, all while onboarding pulls a leader or manager away from critical work.

For many local SMEs (already facing 70%-80% failure rates), every single recruit could be the difference between scaling and failing…

The LinkedIn application vortex

SA’s latest employment figures put youth unemployment at 43,8%. So, no lack of candidates. Just hit the LinkedIn Jobs tab, and you’ll see jobs posted only a few hours ago already have hundreds of applicants.

Founders and HR teams are often bombarded by applications (many of which don’t even meet the minimum requirements). Why? Well, many are still hiring based on legacy credentials when the modern economy demands adaptable future skills, like problem-solving and grit.

In some tech domains, skills have a half-life of roughly 2.5 years. And in a world of AI, hiring for static credentials gets you nowhere, painfully slowly.

The local player finding the right fit

LaunchPath is an AI-powered recruitment platform built for SMEs who can’t afford to get hiring wrong.

Founded by GetSmarter and UCT Online High School veteran Yazid Bohardien, LaunchPath uses a rules-based engine and scenario-based assessments to measure aptitude, adaptability and problem-solving ability, to narrow hundreds of applications down to a curated shortlist of five well-matched candidates.

Candidates sign up via Google and complete a structured profile with all the basic info normally contained in a CV (super helpful for first-time applicants). Then it gives them some quickfire, scenario-based questions to assess their aptitude and problem-solving abilities.

Helping companies hire smarter

On the flip side, for employers, the platform forces clarity at the start of the process, helping founders and HR really, deeply define what a role actually requires and the culture fit. After that, the rules-based engine provides five matched candidates within 48 hours.

LaunchPath then integrates with Google Calendar to track interview schedules, giving both candidates and interviewers some personalised preparation – some added "soft handling" helps anxious youth candidates be fully prepared before the meeting even starts.

Another beautiful human layer is that every unsuccessful candidate receives a personal call from a LaunchPath success coach to help prepare them for their next application. 💚

In a market where hiring feels risky, reducing decision uncertainty might be the real innovation.

We’re watching this space…

When is AI going too far? Meta just patented an AI that can keep posting and chatting after someone dies, raising big questions around consent, grief tech, and platform control. Read more here.

Want agents but can’t train your own? Claw AI Market lets you post digital tasks, and autonomous agents will bid on the job and complete them end-to-end. Still in beta, for now. Try it here.

🏡 Searching for property like a data analyst? FindHomes layers deeds data, price history, and image-based search over listings so buyers can see real investment signals. Check it out here.

Get more updates on AI and business news here.

In tech, features open doors. Trust keeps them open…

Every founder can build something brilliant — faster, smarter, better. But after the demo haze fades, customers make a deeply human decision: Do I trust this enough to buy again?

That’s where brand comes in. Not as a logo, a font or a tagline, but as the system that builds shared identity, shared values and shared rituals. It’s what turns a great product into a movement.

Shared identity makes people feel like they belong. Shared values prove that what you build stands for something. Shared rituals turn your customers into your community.

Because, in the end, people don’t buy from the smartest company; they buy from the one they believe in.

Your product earns attention. Your brand earns permission.

Permission to try. Permission to stay. Permission to grow.

So if you’re ready to move from brilliant to believable, we can help.

🏆 SA Leads AI in Africa. Add it to our ever-growing list of accolades: South Africa leads the rest of Africa in AI adoption. No wonder we’re seeing so many awesome new local AI ventures in recent years. Check out what it could mean for SA.

⚒️ Digging In. While SA mining remains a significant GDP contributor, signs are that the once-powerhouse of our economy is slowing. Declining employment, decreased exploration and a slowed gold output… Find out what’s happening in SA mining.

📱 Your Health on Chat. Local HealthTech Strove has just launched its full service on WhatsApp. Users can track their well-being, earn and unlock rewards, and get AI-based guidance and insights every day with Strove Lite’s launch on WhatsApp.

🚫 No Mo AI for EU MPs? Members of the European Parliament have been blocked from using the baked-in AI tools on their work devices as IT fears cybersecurity and privacy risks of uploaded data to AI company servers. Hmmm, interesting.

📊 Smarter Decisions in 2026. Finance is the biggest reason SA SMEs fail. Finvoke gives startups and small businesses CFO-level insight (without paying a full-time salary) so you can grow with clarity, not guesswork.*

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

Yesterday, we showed you how Paystahio’s bringing virtual company credit cards to SA, asking how you handle company expenses. Most pay out of pocket…

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ 📨 Ask for permission, and wait for approval (24%)

🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🙏 Ask for forgiveness, and hope it’s not flagged (19%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🤑 Just get it done, no questions, no paper trail (11%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 😭 Pay out of pocket, resenting the 30-day reimbursement (35%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ ☠️ Death to the project/client lunch (11%)

Your 2 cents…

Great advice, Ludwig. We still have a R200 slip from years ago at our first job that never got reimbursed. Sigh. 😔

Private power investment in SA hits R158 billion, the biggest surge in eight years.

South Africa’s private energy boom is accelerating fast:

💡 Nearly 600 new generation projects were registered with Nersa in 2025.

💡 The projects add 7'464MW of capacity; about 3'300MW more than 2024.

💡 Since 2018, 98% of registered projects have been wind or solar PV.

For founders and investors, the signal is clear: South Africa’s power transition is no longer hypothetical; it’s a capital-heavy reality reshaping the energy market.

🚀 Tool to Try: SubSmith turns your own videos into language lessons, so you can learn with the shows you love.

🧊 That’s Interesting: In a bid to lay claim to Antarctica, countries Argentina and Chile encouraged people to give birth there. So far, 11 people have been born on the frozen continent.

🌊 Next Level: Watch pro water sport athlete Nikolas Plytas land the world’s first surf-foilboarding double backflip.

📊 Hack: This guide shows the global reputation ranking of the 60 major economies. Hey, why’s SA slipping?

🌍 Wow Site: Live Through Time lets you walk through historical eras in an AI-driven simulation (still in beta).