Innovation and entrepreneurship: are we commercialising our creativity?

South Africa is in the top 5% of countries by value of its private equity market as a proportion of GDP but in the bottom 5% by the same measure of venture capital.

This was one of the startling facts to emerge at the Technological Innovation and Entrepreneurship Round Table in Pretoria on Tuesday, which I attended. It was organised by the National Advisory Council on Innovation (NACI), an agency of the Department of Science and Technology.

The implication of this disparity is that we have a thriving market for private investment in mostly medium to large businesses that generate predictable cash flows and profits, but a weak market for investment – sourced from both the public and private sectors and individuals – in start-up, early-stage and development-stage businesses.

Unity Fellowship Church still at loggerheads with the City of Joburg

This afternoon I got a call from a member of the Unity Fellowship Church in Chiawelo, Soweto. He informed me that the church was conducting a sit-in at the Rea Vaya bus station next to the City of Joburg municipal offices in Braamfontein. They had just been muscled off the public square next to the Mayor's parlour, where they had requested a meeting with the Mayor to demand an answer to their petition lodged in June calling on the City to address the church's grievances.

Ad Hoc Joint Committee on Probing Violence against Foreign Nationals fails to adopt its report

The Parliamentary Ad Hoc Joint Committee on Probing Violence against Foreign Nationals sat yesterday at 5pm, supposedly for the last time. Except that of the twenty Members of the Committee, only six showed up so it was unable to form the quorum necessary to adopt its report. 

My DA colleague Sej Motau MP and I were the only National Assembly Members to attend the meeting.

Reflections on the LeaderEx / SiMODiSA Start-up Scale-Up Summit

The Sandton Convention Centre buzzed with excitement and expectation on Thursday as members of South Africa's entrepreneurial ecosystem - an informal club of growing confidence and distinction - gathered for the first combined LeaderEx / SiMODiSA Start-Up Scale-Up summit.

Aimed at achieving scale and critical mass, the merging of the two events provided participants with a smorgasbord of choice, with over 200 exhibitors, a programme of 40 intense masterclasses, and opportunities for one-on-one sessions with some of South Africa's top business coaches.

Letter to Business Day about the National Gazelles programme.

Today's Business Day publishes my letter drawing readers' attention to the fact that Thami Mazwai failed to disclose in his article of 9th September that the Department of Small Business Development hired his company, Mtiya Dynamics, to formulate the National Gazelles programme he writes so approvingly about.
I have sent a written question  to Minister Zulu to explain how the Department procured the services of Mtiya Dynamics.

Read my earlier blog post here for a longer version of the letter.

National Gazelles programme aims too low

Minister of Small Business Development Lindiwe Zulu’s launch of the National Gazelles programme was a damp squib, attracting hardly any media coverage or commentary. That Dr Thami Mazwai used his Business Day column (9^th September) to highlight it is not surprising: the Department hired him to formulate it, which he does not disclose in his column.

The DA has asked the Minister to explain how her department procured the programme from Mtiya Dynamics, headed by ANC-cheerleader Mazwai, and Martin Feinstein. The Department does not appear to have followed any tender process.

Motion without Notice congratulating the creators of the Philippi Village business incubator

Today I moved a Motion without Notice in the House of Assembly recognising the opening of the Philippi Village, which I attended yesterday. It was a wonderful occasion, with music and dance to entertain us and some bearably short but good speeches from all the organisations involved in creating this amazing space. Helen Zille was the keynote speaker and said that she remembered the cement factory as a political incubator, not the business incubator that it has become. An apposite metaphor.

As with all Motions without Notice moved in the House for the past few weeks, the EFF objected, so it would not be written into the Parliamentary record. These spoiling tactics of the EFF are getting on everyone's nerves and will come back to haunt them.