Hi there,

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In this Open Letter:

• Startup awards: Top movers in 11 sizzling industries.

• Elon’s bot wars, the Drake in you & why are SA CEOs dumping stocks?

• Big insights: Building an African data company with AI.

• Free coffee: Plus startup tools when you share this.

TRENDING NOW

Top 60 to Watch this Year

Startup today, scale up tomorrow, IPO soon?

It’s tough building a startup – so many daily challenges. Founders often just need a win somewhere. So we’re all for recognising exceptional contributions toward changing entire industries – like StartupClubZA launching its inaugural Startup of the Year Awards. And we managed to get our hands on the shortlist of 60 startups that made it to round two. Wanna see?

Special edition: Today’s Letter is a bit different, but it’s worth it. Short on time? Skip ahead to the industries that tickle your fancy.

These are the 2nd round main categories and their finalists:

Mobility/Logistics

Think of it as the bloodstream of the modern world; it's all about moving goods, people, and information from A to B in a flash, like FedEx on steroids. Estimated to be an R 400 billion industry in 2023 and, with Amazon on the way, it will likely grow faster than most sectors.

The finalists:

• TUNL

• Michanic

• RNR App

• ShipRazor

Biotech

This is where science fiction takes a DNA test and finds out it's 50% reality. Biotech firms are cooking up everything from designer drugs to lab-grown burgers. Predicted to be a R64 billion global industry by 2030, Biotech is on the rise.

The finalists:

• Smartroots

• Afrobodies

• Maltento

• Newform Foods

Future of Work

Imagine the office and remote work had a baby, then raised it in a co-working space with nannies like AI and Machine Learning. Voilà, that's the future of work! Covid lockdowns forced changes to the way we work. How big is this industry? Hard to say, but basically every single job could be affected by it. So it's big.

The finalists:

• Adbot

• Jobox

• ServCraft

• WorkWeek

• JOBJACK

• Bento

• Lawyered Up

• PikUniq

EdTech

This is Hogwarts but digitised – spellbinding tech that transforms traditional education into a magical learning experience. The South African Government budgets about R28 billion a year on education. What’s more, private education has been booming of late. Big challenges, big opportunities, big money to be made.

The finalists:

• Resolute Education

• Yenza

• Matric Live

• Bookt

Informal Market

Picture a bustling bazaar minus any corporate suits. This is where grassroots entrepreneurship meets raw consumer needs, often without barcodes or tax IDs. Recently, we showed how this sector could be bigger than agriculture and mining combined at an estimated R425 billion a year.

The finalists:

• Loop

• Mapha

• Komuniti

• Timbaktuu Jobs

ClimateTech

It's like Earth just swiped right on its own set of Avengers, heroes tackling climate change with everything from renewable energy to carbon capture. Whether you recognise climate change or not, green companies introducing cost benefits are popping up everywhere and this R400 billion global market is set to continue to grow faster than others.

The finalists:

• Kudoti

• Tweak Carbon

• AgriLogiq

• Verisola

• Arable Grow

• Amnova

E-commerce

It's the digital mall of your dreams, where you can window-shop in your PJs, and a courier is your personal Santa Claus all year round. Amazon is coming, but local players are making moves as online sales reach an estimated R30 billion a year in SA. Not shooting the lights out yet, but signs of life, that's for sure.

The finalists:

• Artisans Tade Depot

• TradeFed

• Joboy

• SwiftVEE

• Swifti

• WISI-Oi

AI and Big Data

Sherlock Holmes and Watson in ones and zeros, solving the mysteries of human behaviour and big business alike. And this space is enormous. Generative AI is set to become a R24.6 trillion market globally. It’s huge.

The finalists:

• MobileGPT

• Visiosoft

• Carscan

• Melio AI

• Kriterion

• The Awareness Company

FinTech

Your grandpa's bank got a glow-up and now it's streamlined, sleek, and can probably predict what you'll want to spend on next. How big is FinTech? Globally, it's set to become R 13.250 trillion by 2030.

The finalists:

• Float Technologies

• Momint

• Skrmiish

• Troygold

• Capital Art

• Revio

PropTech

It's like playing SimCity but in real life, using tech to build, manage, and jazz up physical spaces. The residential segment in SA alone is a R360 billion industry – add commercial and it's simply massive.

The finalists:

• Popping

• InvestRand

• Parket

• LeaseSurance

HealthTech

Imagine if your doctor was a Jedi, armed with gadgets and data analytics to keep you fit as a fiddle. NHI might be coming and many medical professionals have traded in the stethoscope for the laptop as they embark on the entrepreneurial journey to take part in this R418 billion market.

The finalists:

• Kena Health

• Zoie Health

• DelMed

• VitruvianMD

• Mia Health

• Strove

• Contro

• BioCertica

A big shoutout to all these startups and the teams involved – be sure to head on over and vote for your favourites.

Also, thanks to Mathew Marsden and the StartupClubZA team for putting the awards together and showcasing SA’s startup talent.

IN SHORT

🤖 Bot War. Elon Musk is said to charge $1 for new users of X in a bid to combat the crypto-bots and scammers. The annual charge has been rolled out to New Zealand and the Philippines on Wednesday.

💰 Share Moves. Truworths CEO & Deputy CEO have sold over R 90 million in shares over the last 2 months. And they’re not the only ones. Just last week the Shoprite Group announced that its non-executive director, Christo Wiese sold almost R 1 billion worth of shares. Not to mention the nearly R210 million in sales of Naspers shares – in 2023 alone.

👨‍🔬 Space Cape. NASA is sending 2 of its modified jets to Cape Town to conduct a biodiversity field campaign with the University of Cape Town. ‘BioSCape’ will see local and US scientists map marine, freshwater and terrestrial species and ecosystems within the Western Cape.

🎙️ Fake Drake. Wanna sing like a famous person? Well, thanks to YouTube and AI – you could do so quite soon. YouTube is allegedly in talks with major record labels to obtain the rights to songs it could use to train the tool.

🍫 Beastly Sweetie. Mega YouTuber Mr Beast’s chocolate brand “Feastable Chocolate Bars” will launch in SA today. The 4 variants will be available exclusively at Game and Makro stores for 50 bucks for a 60g bar.

30-MINUTE PODCAST

Building a Data Company in the Age of AI

Whether you’re interested in the AI- or data-as-a-business space, or just looking to gain deeper insights into the true value of data for your own use and business, this week’s podcast is absolutely required material.

We spoke to Priaash Ramadeen, co-founder and CEO of The Awareness Company, who is building African AI-powered data solutions that are more accessible and actionable than the normal “overloaded, under-used” stuff in the data space. Check it out…

Some of the juicy bits…

1. Data is power (if you use it right)

We all have a lot of data (much of it unused), with a lot of people jumping on the data bandwagon. But as Priaash affirms, data alone is not useful, it’s all about the application of it – how effectively you can draw actionable insights from data.

And that requires a lot of refining to turn it into stories, yet Priaash says most Data Centres spend up to 60% of their time on cleaning data, leaving precious little time for getting real insights.

2. Unlocking true value from data

As Priaash points out, when most people hear data they think of measurement or niche applications. So they instead built a business around being able to better extract valuable stories from data and then build in mechanisms that allow everyone at every level of the company to actually access data to benefit them in their individual roles.

3. Creating your own data

As the discussion flows to the quality of data in South Africa, Priaash makes the point that our data only feels chaotic because we tend to build it up bit by bit over time, and then try to retroactively make sense of what we’ve been able to gather so far.

The next paradigm is to be able to build the data your company really needs from scratch, which is why their service is built around coming and really building structured data with a purpose from the ground up. And yes, you can integrate data from current systems, but it has to absolutely make sense for you to get actual actionable insights with AI models.

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