Renier Kriel: The role of media in growing South Africa's tech ecosystem

Renier Kriel: The role of media in growing South Africa's tech ecosystem

South Africa’s startup ecosystem often talks about funding as its biggest challenge, but according to Renier Kriel, founder of The Open Letter, visibility may be just as important. Kriel reflected on how a personal frustration with the lack of meaningful local technology and business coverage led him to launch The Open Letter nearly four years ago. Having previously built and exited a technology agency, he wanted a platform that went beyond funding announcements to explain why businesses matter, what problems they are solving, and where opportunities exist. That philosophy has helped transform The Open Letter from a niche startup newsletter into one of South Africa’s most engaged business and technology media platforms. Today, the publication reaches more than 40,000 readers, including startup founders, corporate executives, investors and decision-makers across some of the country’s largest companies. Kriel believes media can play a direct role in helping startups grow by connecting them with customers, partners and investors. He shared examples of founders receiving business inquiries and partnership opportunities shortly after being featured in the newsletter, reinforcing his belief that better media can help unlock growth across the ecosystem. Unlike traditional publishers, The Open Letter has built its business around long-term partnerships rather than relying heavily on advertising or subscriptions. Kriel argues that competing with technology giants such as Google and Meta for advertising revenue is increasingly difficult, while subscription models remain challenging in many African markets. Instead, the company focuses on creating value for both its audience and commercial partners through newsletters, events and community initiatives. Looking ahead, Kriel sees a future where technology and business journalism become increasingly intertwined. As technology-native generations move into leadership positions, he believes business news will need to be viewed through a technology lens, reflecting the reality that almost every company is becoming a technology company in one way or another. For The Open Letter, that future extends beyond newsletters. The company is investing in communities, events and new content verticals while exploring opportunities to feature more stories from neighbouring markets, including Botswana, Namibia and Zimbabwe. But at its core, the mission remains unchanged: helping founders and innovators tell their stories and get the attention they deserve. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit techaways.substack.com [https://techaways.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Lungisa Matshoba: Why Yoco believes the future of fintech is solving more than payments

When Yoco processed its first transaction more than a decade ago, the startup had a simple mission: help South African small businesses accept card payments. Today, that mission has expanded far beyond payments. According to Yoco Chief Product Officer Lungisa Matshoba, the company now sees itself less as a payments provider and more as a technology platform designed to help small businesses run, grow and understand their businesses better. “The first product we launched was actually two products,” Matshoba said. “We launched payments, but we also launched a point-of-sale system. From day one, businesses didn’t engage with us as just a payments company. They engaged with us as a solution provider.” That early insight fundamentally changed how Yoco approached product development. Rather than focusing solely on payment acceptance, the company began building tools aimed at solving a wider range of challenges facing small businesses. Over the years, this has included products such as Yoco Capital, online payments, invoicing, customer management tools and cloud-based point-of-sale systems. For Matshoba, the long-term opportunity lies in helping entrepreneurs reclaim time and grow their businesses more effectively. Many small businesses still spend hours manually reconciling payments, inventory and sales data across disconnected systems. Yoco’s strategy is to eliminate these inefficiencies by creating a unified platform where everything works together. “You don’t reconcile between the same system,” he explained. “The system knows the data. It’s fundamentally there. This takes away the burden of time from the business owner.” The next step is helping businesses grow. Yoco has increasingly focused on products that help merchants bring customers back, increase spending and improve customer experiences. Even seemingly simple features, such as integrated tipping functionality, are designed with growth in mind. According to Matshoba, happier employees often lead to better customer experiences and ultimately stronger business performance. The company’s ambition is clear: become the digital infrastructure layer that powers small-business commerce. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit techaways.substack.com [https://techaways.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Jesaya Hano-Oshike: How this $10 million fund plans to back Southern Africa's innovators

Jesaya Hano-Oshike: How this $10 million fund plans to back Southern Africa’s innovators For years, Southern Africa’s startup ecosystem has found itself stuck in an uncomfortable position. The region has no shortage of entrepreneurs building interesting businesses, yet very little venture capital flows into markets outside South Africa. Jesaya Hano-Oshike, Managing Director of Bellatrix Investment Managers, believes that the gap represents an opportunity. Bellatrix recently launched the Ndjaba Seed Fund, a $10 million venture capital vehicle focused on backing early-stage startups across Southern Africa. The fund will invest in between 35 and 50 startups over a 10-year period, targeting sectors such as fintech, healthcare, agriculture value chains, cleantech, e-commerce, and enterprise software. Speaking on the Tech Aways Podcast, Hano-Oshike said the idea behind the fund emerged from observing how African startup funding continues concentrating in Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt, and South Africa, while founders in countries like Namibia, Botswana, Zambia, and Zimbabwe struggle to access capital. “Most of the funding that comes to Africa goes into the big four markets,” he said. “Very little then trickles down to the rest of the countries.” Rather than seeing Southern Africa’s fragmented markets as a weakness, Bellatrix sees them as an overlooked regional opportunity. Hano-Oshike argues that investors often underestimate the scale of the broader SADC market because they evaluate countries individually instead of as a connected economic bloc. “People look at Namibia or Botswana individually and say the markets are small,” he said. “But if you look at SADC as a whole, it is a 400 million population market.” The fund itself will operate across two layers of investment. At the pre-seed stage, Bellatrix plans to back startups that have moved beyond the idea stage and already have an MVP, early users, or limited traction. These startups will typically receive between $25,000 and $150,000 to help them refine products and build early revenue streams. The majority of the capital, however, will go toward seed-stage businesses already showing meaningful traction or generating revenue. Bellatrix wants those startups to use the capital to scale into neighbouring Southern African markets before eventually raising larger rounds from international investors or private equity firms. Importantly, Hano-Oshike says the fund is not trying to become a controlling shareholder in startups. Bellatrix intends to take minority positions, generally below 30%, while remaining flexible on structures depending on the maturity of the business. While equity will remain the preferred structure, the firm is also open to convertible debt and SAFEs in specific situations. “We’re looking at equity first,” Hano-Oshike said, noting that alternative financing structures would mostly be used on a case-by-case basis for more mature businesses with predictable cash flows. What also differentiates the Ndjaba Seed Fund from many traditional VC firms is its emphasis on operational support. Bellatrix says it does not want to function purely as a provider of capital. Instead, the firm plans to work closely with founders on governance, operations, marketing, finance, and regional expansion strategy. Part of that support system already exists through Basecamp Business Incubator, a Namibian incubator Bellatrix helps operate. According to Hano-Oshike, the incubator has already worked with more than 3,000 entrepreneurs over the past three and a half years, giving the firm an established founder pipeline and ecosystem network. The fund also plans to collaborate with incubators and accelerators across Botswana, Zambia, South Africa, and other Southern African countries to source startups and support founders after investment. When evaluating startups, Bellatrix says it will prioritise both market potential and founder quality. “It can be a great idea, but if the team is not great, the likelihood of success is not that high,” Hano-Oshike said. Beyond venture capital itself, the launch of the Ndjaba Seed Fund reflects a broader ambition around Southern Africa’s role in technology development. Hano-Oshike believes the region needs to move beyond simply consuming technology developed elsewhere and begin building more locally relevant innovation ecosystems — particularly around emerging technologies like artificial intelligence. “We should not only be followers,” he said. “We should also try to be leaders in technology.” Application form: https://mulastream.com/ This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit techaways.substack.com [https://techaways.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Florence Bavanandan: Inside Botswana Tech Fund's £50 million mission to fund Southern Africa startups

For years, most African venture capital has flowed into the continent’s biggest startup ecosystems — Nigeria, Kenya, Egypt, and South Africa. Southern Africa’s smaller markets have largely been overlooked. But according to Florence Bavanandan, general partner of the Botswana Tech Fund, that is exactly where the opportunity lies. Bavanandan described the fund’s strategy as a “contrarian thesis” focused on backing startups in Botswana and neighbouring countries like Namibia, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. “Where everyone is not looking, that’s where the opportunity is,” she said. The fund plans to invest in tech-first B2B startups solving infrastructure challenges around payments, ecommerce, logistics, and digitisation. Rather than competing directly in saturated markets, the thesis is built around helping startups scale across Southern Africa’s underserved economies. One of the fund’s more unusual features is its dual strategy. Alongside a pre-seed accelerator programme, the fund will also deploy growth capital from seed to Series C, allowing it to continue backing its best-performing startups as they scale. At the accelerator stage, startups will initially receive $25,000 to cover operating costs, with the potential to unlock another $75,000 after completing the programme and agreed milestones. The fund is targeting roughly 10% ownership in accelerator-stage companies. Unlike many accelerators that focus heavily on training, Bavanandan said the Botswana Tech Fund wants to position itself as “investing first and accelerating second.” Importantly, the fund says it is backing founders as much as products. “At this super early stage, it’s all about the founder,” Bavanandan said, arguing that resilience, adaptability, and the ability to pivot matter more than perfect products. The fund is also leaning heavily into AI-native businesses and infrastructure-focused startups. Bavanandan pointed to payments infrastructure and wallet-based financial systems as examples of the types of scalable businesses the fund hopes to support. Beyond venture returns, the Botswana Tech Fund also has a conservation component. A portion of the fund’s carried interest will go toward the Tuli Conservation Trust, linking entrepreneurship and job creation to anti-poaching and tourism sustainability efforts in Botswana. For Bavanandan, the broader goal is not simply to back startups, but to help build a regional innovation ecosystem capable of attracting more capital into Southern Africa over time. “Africa doesn’t need another failed VC fund,” she said. Startups can apply for the fund here [https://form.typeform.com/to/RgK9YXLq?typeform-source=www.linkedin.com]. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit techaways.substack.com [https://techaways.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]

Naco Bolote: Assessing the state of cross border payments & remittances in Africa

Africa’s push toward deeper regional trade integration continues to run into a stubborn obstacle: moving money across the continent remains slow, fragmented, and expensive. Despite years of fintech innovation and billions of dollars flowing into African startups, cross-border payments across Africa are still heavily dependent on foreign currencies, fragmented regulatory systems, and infrastructure that was never designed primarily for intra-African trade. According to Naco Bolote, the continent’s biggest payments challenge is ultimately fragmentation, not just of payment rails, but also of policy, governance, and financial systems. “Africa is crying out for unity,” Bolote says, arguing that the continent still lacks the seamless financial infrastructure needed to support meaningful intra-African trade. He notes that sending money between African countries often still requires routing transactions through international financial hubs such as London or New York because local systems remain poorly interconnected. The problem becomes even more complex because much of Africa’s trade still depends on the US dollar as an intermediary currency. That reliance creates multiple pressures simultaneously. Dollar liquidity remains scarce in many African markets, foreign exchange controls differ significantly between countries, and transaction costs remain high. Bolote says these realities continue to slow both business payments and remittances across the continent. At the same time, geopolitical shifts are beginning to reshape how African policymakers and financial institutions think about financial sovereignty. Bolote argues that relying on payment rails and currencies controlled outside Africa creates vulnerabilities for the continent’s economies, especially at a time when countries globally are becoming increasingly sensitive about control over financial infrastructure. “It means you can easily be cut off the rails,” he says, referring to the global payment systems many African transactions still depend on. These challenges have helped fuel growing interest in alternative payment technologies such as stablecoins. Dollar-backed stablecoins are increasingly being explored as a way to reduce transfer costs, improve settlement times, and ease liquidity shortages in African markets. But Bolote believes they only partially solve the continent’s long-term problem because they remain tied to foreign currencies. Still, he sees major opportunities for innovation. Botswana, he argues, could potentially position itself as a regional hub for stablecoin innovation because of its relatively liberal regulatory environment around currency management. Longer term, Bolote believes Africa could eventually develop digital currencies backed by African commodities and designed specifically for regional trade. “My vision is really how do we create a stablecoin that is fundamentally African, designed for Africa, and backed by assets that we find in Africa,” he says. The conversation around cross-border payments also increasingly overlaps with the rise of African fintech startups. Over the last decade, fintech has attracted the largest share of venture capital funding on the continent, with startups attempting to solve problems ranging from remittances and settlement to liquidity management and compliance. But Bolote believes many of these companies are still building on top of global infrastructure that Africa does not fully control. Rather than replacing banks, he sees the future of African payments being driven by collaboration between banks, fintechs, mobile money operators, and regulators. “The entire problem is going to be solved by even banks themselves collaborating, fintechs collaborating with fintechs, fintechs collaborating with banks,” he says. That collaboration is becoming increasingly important as remittances continue to play a larger role in African economies. Africa received more than $100 billion in remittance inflows in 2024, with diaspora transfers contributing significantly to household income and foreign currency inflows across several economies. Yet sending money into Africa remains among the most expensive remittance corridors globally. Bolote believes the next phase of innovation will focus on making transfers more seamless by connecting banks, mobile wallets, fintech platforms, and payment providers into integrated systems that allow funds to move instantly across borders. He also expects the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) to accelerate pressure for cheaper and faster payment infrastructure as trade volumes between African countries increase. For Bolote, however, the continent’s payments problem ultimately comes back to a deeper issue: trust. “Why don’t we trust each other’s currencies?” he asks. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit techaways.substack.com [https://techaways.substack.com?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_1]