Battle ready? Videos of a Chinese engineering student who apparently built a levitating sword that flies (drone props) around at your command are doing the rounds. Looks real. What do you think? 🗡️

In Today’s Open Letter

Most people don’t know there’s a single team behind some of SA’s most successful ventures – but Renier met them years ago in Stellenbosch and shares the story and some of their learnings today…

Back in the late 2000s, I knew about FireID; everyone in the startup ecosystem did. They raised massive rounds of funding, had a big fancy office in Technopark, hired like crazy and were rumoured to be talking to Apple and Epic Games about their product.

Then one day, we got an email to say they are selling their assets. A funding round never came through, and they were downsizing to only the founder, Malan Joubert, and a handful of people.

Some were worried about how this could scare off other investors – this was the venture that attracted some of the first early-stage tech investments made in SA, ever.

But Malan had one question on his mind: “How do you really build a successful tech startup in South Africa?” Keeping the first few customers they had at FireID happy, Malan knew he had to learn from the first mistakes, and he did.

A repertoire to gawk at

Cast forward to 2025, and it boggles the mind to think of the ventures FireID has been involved in building since:

From zero to legend

How did Malan and team go from those early knocks to such an impressive track record today? I asked him. And, you know, building just one startup teaches you a lot. Building multiple in different sectors, there’s reason to believe you have the building game down.

He gave me some insights, and here are a few that stood out:

1. Focus: FireID set out on the journey to figure out how to build a successful startup in SA. The industry, idea, etc., wasn’t even that important – all that mattered was that the venture solved an important problem.

2. Tailored for the local market: They pioneered this concept before The Lean Startup was a thing, before YC had a startup school. Too many local founders get caught up in advice coming from the US. You have to figure out how the SA market works to build here. 

3. Talent: They hustled to get the smartest people to come and work there, from actually launching entire projects just to attract smart devs (how do you think OfferZen got started?) to engaging endlessly with the smartest people they met – luckily, Stellenbosch is just crawling with talent; read more about it in this piece by Johan Fourie.

4. Relentless learning: You need to hyperfocus on solving a problem until it works. The game is all about unbroken focus and channelled learning until you are sure something works well.

… The rest will be unpacked at our Stellenbosch event tonight.

That’s right, we’re hosting Malan Joubert at the Workshack in Stellenbosch, where he’ll be sharing even more of his learnings building some of SA’s biggest startup names with FireID.

Unfortunately, tickets are sold out. But don’t despair, we have more epic events lined up for Johannesburg on 18 September and Cape Town on 30 October (tickets available soon!).

A big shoutout to our incredible event partners: Cloud on Demand, Workshack, Blaauwklippen and Devils Peak Lager. Can’t wait to see many of you tonight!

Need to prep for back-to-back meetings? MeetingHero.AI connects to your calendar and auto-generates summaries, bios, org insights and more — so you walk in ready. No more late-night LinkedIn stalking or last-minute Google searches. Just sharp, fast prep powered by AI. Try it out.

Want to level up faster? Zettel uses AI to gamify anything you want to learn by mapping any learning source into clear, structured, personalised curricula — from startup fundraising to quantum computing. You set the outcome, Zettel builds the roadmap and helps you stick to it. Like Notion and Duolingo had an AI baby. Explore here.

Sick of having to perfectly prompt AI? Kuse specialises in taking your chaos and structuring it. Give it your files, random links, videos, half-written notes and vague prompts, and it’ll spit out fully-formed outputs — think documents, slides, meeting packs and landing pages. Your tone. Your format. Just cleaner, faster. Upload anything.

What’s the surest way to kill a real feeling of appreciation for a colleague?

Subject it to a five-step nomination form for the quarterly #Values award to see if your boss’s boss approves it… 

Most teams know recognition matters. But clunky HR tools and top-down programmes just don’t cut it anymore. You’ve got culture to build, talent to retain and no time for bloated rollouts.

What if appreciation felt… natural?

That’s why Zuzo exists — it’s an employee recognition tool built inside Slack and MS Teams, that allows co-workers to give rewards of recognition.

✅ No separate platforms.

✅ No additional HR process.

✅ Just instant, meaningful praise and instant, spend-anywhere rewards.

Recognition with your people, not to them.

And it’s already trusted by growing SA teams, employing between 17 and 700 people.

Built by Yoyo – makers of the WiCode –, Geoff Forbes and the Zuzo team are making culture scale without making it feel corporate.

Ready to make recognition easy and effective?

🌍 Opening the Floodgates. Flood’s raised a hefty R63M to bring offline commerce merchants into the digital age, transferring transactions and loyalty programs into apps people already use. Congrats, Flood team.

🚀 Travel Pay Boost. TurnStay, the South African FinTech that’s whipping Africa’s travel payment inefficiencies into shape, just bagged R34M to bolster its market reach. Nice one, TurnStay team.

🔒 Hi, Dear. WhatsApp is rolling out new security upgrades to take down major scam operations, having already banned 6.8 million sketchy accounts in 2025. Watch out for features that flag fishy strangers and dodge dodgy dealings. About time.

👆MTN's Biometric Play. MTN SA is rolling out real-time biometric ID systems (using fingerprint and facial recognition) to all its stores after a pilot improved onboarding efficiency and reduced identity fraud. Very cool.

✅ The Stack. Founders need tools and suppliers they can trust. Check out our Founder’s Stack with your own CFO for a fraction of the cost with OCFO, WhatsApp marketing with 2'000% ROI powered by Chat Inc, and loads more vital startup tools & services.

Yesterday, we showed you how Nile.ag is using marketplace data for better agri risk management and finance, asking what you’d grow/raise if you were a farmer. And it’s a two-way between veg and cattle…

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🥬 Organic veggies for city markets (29%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🥩 Grass-fed cattle for premium beef (29%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🌽 Big-scale maize and grain for the nation (10%)

🟨🟨🟨🟨⬜️⬜️ 🐝 Something niche — like honey or macadamias (22%)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💬 Got a wild card? Drop it in the comments (10%)

Your 2 cents…

Sounds like a party, Chris. We’re there. 🫒☕

Aitsa, Liesl. We were thinking chickens and mielies, but escargot will hit the spot. 🐌

For medicinal purposes, of course, Rhys. 🌿

That’s definitely the future of food and farming, Liam. 💚

In SA, how you pay bills depends on what you earn…

Survey data shows:

💡 Households earning R8k—R75k+ per month mostly pay bills through their bank.

💡 Below R8k, people are more likely to head to retailers — 70% of those earning under R3.5k do.

💡 The split highlights how VAS buying habits are deeply tied to income and lifestyle.

This shows the amazing power retail has in the lower-income market segment.

Perhaps an opportunity to disrupt this with, say, a WhatsApp solution?

🛠 Tool to Try: Tovik makes your website multilingual in minutes — no devs, no code. Just plug it in and speak your users' language.

🤔 That’s crazy: A man was trapped on an abandoned ship for 4 years — alone, without power — after Egypt detained it and the company went bankrupt.

🔥 Next Level: The world’s buffest cat taking a drink from the fountain.

🍔 Hack: Better sleep? Step outside for 5 minutes of real sunset light. It signals your brain to wind down, no apps or filters needed.

🌐 Wow Site: Spurious Correlations makes hilarious charts proving why similar-seeming trends don’t mean they’re related. Stats nerds and founders, you’ll love this.

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