Business innovation is booming in South Africa as more entrepreneurs turn ideas into scalable businesses that stand to disrupt major industries internationally.
BrandsEye, a company that mines opinion on social media, emerged the overall winner of the FNB Business Innovation Awards .
The company is “ regarded as the world’s only accurate opinion mining company,” according to FNB.
The third annual awards are a partnership between FNB and Endeavor South Africa.
“Africa is not always an easy place to live, but I think that makes people think about ‘how can I make people’s lives better’ and I think we’ve got the ability to create really great innovation, ” says BrandEye founder Craig Raw.
He says the company has been in business for over 10 years and it has evolved to its current state.
“We certainly didn’t come up with what it is today, we needed a lot of time to figure it out as we went,” says Raw.
The company plans to expand to London , Dubai and the United States.
“Often entrepreneurs are ahead of where the market is and you have to survive long enough for people to care about what you’ve built,” says BrandsEye CEO Jean-Pierre Kloppers .
“The finalists all demonstrate the talent South Africa has in producing high-impact entities that are not only innovative, but have scalable business models that make them globally competitive, ” says Mike Vacy-Lyle, CEO FNB Business.
We’re certainly not screening for companies that have not shown diversity
Little diversity seen at innovation awards
Twelve finalists attended the black-tie gala awards evening in Johannesburg last week.
Of the 12 finalists, only one woman, Aisha Pandor – co-founder of Sweep South, was among the finalists.
There were also no black owned companies among the finalists.
” We’re certainly not screening for companies that have not shown diversity. We are looking for best in class, scalable businesses,” says Catherine Townshend, Endeavor South Africa Managing Director, when asked if there were not enough black companies that entered the competition.
“The youngest business here is ten years old and I’m hoping that over the years we see an influx of both female and black entrepreneurs come in,” says Marcel Klaassen, Executive Head of Growth for FNB Business Banking.
He says FNB has a number of initiatives that support entrepreneurs and accelerates in business.
“This provides a great platform just to inspire and continually motivate that charm of young black and female entrepreneurs,” he says.
“It’s those younger entepreneurs that are on to great ideas and great innovation that need that kind of incubation to really help them accelerate,” he says.
“Tonight’s about those guys who have been doing it for fifteen, twenty years and have the scale that we want to role models,’ says Klaassen.
“We’re looking at businesses that are growing at about 40% per annum. That’s an exceptional growth rate and we also recognise that these are businesses that have been around for about five to six years,” says Townshend.
She says the competition was not looking for start-ups, but for “scalable’ businesses.
“In terms of women and ownership, I would says certainly this year we have not seen as many co-founders or founders,” says Townshend.
She says gender representations for Endeavor’s global portfolio stands at “40% – 50% in terms of women ownership”.
Townshend says she is confident that a diversity transition is taking place. “We must also be realistic, it takes time”.
– By Matiba Sibanyoni
