So funny {{ FIRSTNAME | there }}? Seems Anthropic’s Super Bowl ads mocking OpenAI worked, the campaign grew Claude’s user base by 11%. Goeiste. 📈

In This Open Letter

SA has one of the highest drowning rates in the world – but this tech’s getting us help faster…

South Africa’s 3’000 glorious kilometres of coastline mean we love ourselves some water activities. But SA is one of the top 45 countries for drowning rates, and our seas aren’t much kinder to ships: In 2024, nearly half of all the shipping containers lost in the world were around our coasts. 

No wonder our National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI) responds to 1’069 water emergencies per year: 1’548 people, 300 vessels and about 70 animals 😊. That’s about 3 incidents every day.

This past December/January alone, they had 266 callouts, assisting 311 people. Two-thirds of emergencies are thankfully near-shore, but a third are in the deep ocean, which is where search and rescue becomes very complex.

The deep ocean emergency

The ocean is big (117 trillion Olympic-sized pools big), so while radar can find large and metallic ships, locating a human head bobbing around in the ocean is next to impossible, unless you know where to look.

By far the most expensive variable in the NSRI’s entire R187 million operating budget is time and resources spent looking for needles in that salty haystack.

And they’re voluntary and non-profit, meaning it's only our generous donations saving lives around SA shores. So it would be nice to be able to find peeps in need faster…

The app bringing us safely to shore 

NSRI SafeTrx is a free mobile tracking and emergency alerting platform that turns a smartphone into a maritime black box.

It logs your transit plan with the NSRI’s emergency ops centre and then tracks location, heading and phone battery life every kilometre (or five minutes). And, if you don't check in on time, it alerts your emergency contacts and sends the NSRI your last-known GPS coordinates.

What’s really clever is that if you lose signal, the app caches your path and burst-transmits the backlog once you’re back in range, so rescuers also have a precise directional path to search.

And it works:

Sometimes, the simplest solution is to use the sensors we already carry in our pockets. And, taking the search out of the mission reduces cost and saves lives.

We’re watching this space.

Feeling anxious about money?

It’s often because you don’t know where you stand, what’s working and what needs attention.

The Doshguide Financial Health Score gives you clarity in under three minutes.

Answer a short set of questions and instantly see a personalised snapshot of your financial health across cash flow, investments, protection, tax and overall financial wellness. You’ll uncover the blind spots holding you back and the strengths you can build on.

We’ll also give you clear, practical next steps you can act on right now to help you feel in control of your finances.

🐕‍🦺 Dystopian Paw Patrol Assemble. FIFA will have four robot dogs on patrol during the World Cup Guadalupe Mexico this year. The K9X unit botdawgs will use live video streaming and two-way audio to investigate any sketchy stuff before human cops are sent in. Nightmare fuel.

♥️ Feel the Love. South Africa is one of the top 10 countries around the world for feeling loved. According to a new Ipsos Love Life Satisfaction study, 8 out of 10 South Africans feel satisfied with their love lives, a little higher than the global average. Ag, cute man.

👀 Vying for Eyeballs. e.tv and Openview’s parent company eMedia’s free video-on-demand platform eVOD reached 2.2 million registered users in Q3 of 2025, a 22% year-on-year increase. Watch time of the platform’s 9’000+ hours of content is also up 56%. Didn’t even know about it.

📹 Ring’s Back Pedal. Home security company Ring will no longer work with Flock Safety, an AI-powered surveillance camera manufacturer, citing that the integration would “require significantly more time and resources than anticipated”. Ha. So, not all that backlash from their ads, then?

🏆 Global Scale Enabled. Deel Local Payroll (formerly PaySpace) had the product but needed to scale globally. So, SA cloud scaling specialist Cloud on Demand simplified the Azure migration and go-to-market for faster launches, stronger performance and steady inbound leads.*

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

Banks are getting into crypto. Absa is piloting its own stablecoin initiative, including a gold-backed token, as part of a broader push into blockchain-based payments and digital assets. After years of hesitation, traditional banks are now experimenting with faster settlement, cross-border payments and new financial rails.

People aren’t just trading crypto; they’re spending it. And not only inside banking hours: Binance Research’s latest Monthly Market Insights shows crypto card usage jumped 5× last year. That’s people paying at normal shops, crypto converting in the background outside of the bank’s operating hours as crypto moves from charts to checkouts. Download the full report here.

Crypto just got even safer for big investors. Binance and global asset manager Franklin Templeton have launched a new program that lets large investors trade crypto without having to move assets onto exchanges. Regulated finance is blending with digital markets like never before.

Disclaimer: Digital asset prices can be volatile. The value of your investment may go down or up and you may not get back the amount invested. You are solely responsible for your investment decisions and Binance is not liable for any losses you may incur. Not financial advice. For more information, see our Terms of Use and Risk Warning.

Last Friday, we told you how SimplB’s bringing secure company bitcoin treasuries to SA, asking if your business’d ever hold crypto. Not yet for most…

🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🧠 Already doing it (23%)

🟨🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️ 👀 Curious but cautious (32%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 📉 Only in a bull market (9%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🛑 Hard pass — FIAT only (36%)

Your 2 cents…

Totally, Tommy. Hopefully, not sit around and wait too long. ☀️

What You Actually Own – 20 Feb, Online: Jacques Stemmet breaks down IP risks in startups, from contractors and AI tools to investor expectations. Join the session.

Search Is Changing – 27 Feb, Online: Chantelle Bowyer breaks down what AI-powered search means for SEO in 2026 and how to stay visible. Register here.

Building Global Tech From SA – 5 Mar, Stellenbosch: Adii Pienaar shares hard-earned lessons from building and exiting WooCommerce, Conversio and Cogsy. Sadly, sold out.

Lekker Network Summit – 11–12 Mar, Somerset West: Two days of talks, connection and community with The Lekker Network’s global members at Lourensford. View details.

More? See the best and most exciting SA startup and tech events.

🚀 Tool to Try: Launch10 builds you a landing page & Google Search ads setup 10 minutes.

🧠 That’s Interesting: Being able to sit up and down from standing without using your hands or knees to support yourself is a predictor of longevity.

🤸 Next Level: Mowgli and his little brother’s acrobatic dance.

🧩 Hack: A visual guide to soft skills for work.

🕰 Wow Site: Timeliner shows which historical figures were alive at the same time.