TechCentral (main feed)
This is the main feed that collects all of TechCentral's podcasts and shows in one place, including TCS - The TechCentral Show and the TCS Impact Series. TechCentral is a South African technology news outlet, so the episodes cover tech news, industry interviews and analysis. Subscribing to this feed means catching every show the team produces and publishes. It is aimed at listeners who want ongoing coverage of technology and business developments.
Episodes
TCS+ | Vox on AI, data rules and omnichannel communication for SMEs
Phone calls, e-mails and in-person conversations were once the only ways businesses could talk to their customers. Social media changed that. Marketing, customer acquisition, sales and support now happen across a growing number of channels. That brings clear benefits, but it can also leave businesses with a fragmented communication ecosystem that hurts the customer experience.
In this episode of T
TCS | The Cape Town firm quietly connecting Eskom, Pep and 6 000 ATMs
Réan van Niekerk
Metacom has spent 25 years designing its own routers and running private networks for some of Africa's biggest retailers, without a cent of venture capital.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, founder Réan van Niekerk tells Fanie van Rooyen how the Cape Town company came to connect more than 6 000 ATMs, every Pep store in Africa and, by his account, well over half the commu
TCS+ | Boards are underestimating the cost of a cyberattack, says Arctic Wolf
In this episode of TCS+, brought to you by Arctic Wolf, Jason Oehley, the company's country sales manager, and Andre Den Hond, senior systems engineer, talk about why South Africa is bearing the brunt of ransomware in Africa and what businesses can do about it.
The pair unpack an Interpol report that found 92% of ransomware detections on the continent are in South Africa. Oehley explains that the
TCS | Drones, AI and the future of warfare, with Milkor's Daniel du Plessis
Milkor’s advanced 380 drone is flying for a customer in the Middle East, but South Africa’s own defence force has yet to buy one. In this episode of TCS, Milkor vice-president for Africa Daniel du Plessis talks to deputy editor Fanie van Rooyen about why, and about where drones, AI and autonomy are taking modern warfare.
Fresh from the Africa Aerospace and Defence (AAD) expo at Air Force Base Wate
TCS | Frogfoot sees bigger fibre deals coming
Frogfoot plans to keep buying smaller fibre network operators in South Africa’s suburbs as the market consolidates, but CEO Shane Chorley stopped short of ruling out a sale of the business.
“I’d be ignorant to say that we would ignore any offer,” Chorley said on the latest episode of the TechCentral Show – watch or listen below. “I would hope to say that we will be the acquirer rather than being s
Meet the CIO | Vodacom’s Mohamed Sami on the agentic future
Mohamed Sami, group chief information officer at Vodacom, says autonomous AI agents that resolve customer problems without handing them to a human are the next big shift in customer experience – and that it is closer than many think.
Speaking on TechCentral’s Meet the CIO podcast series, brought to you by NTT DATA, Sami said Vodacom’s chatbots and voice bots already handle a considerable share of
TCS | Norrsken22’s Lexi Novitske on how China is winning African tech
Chinese companies have built their position in African technology one layer at a time – first phones and telecoms equipment, then fintech and now the AI models that local start-ups build on. American private capital, meanwhile, is pulling back. Lexi Novitske, general partner at Norrsken22, thinks US investors will regret it.
Novitske moved to Nigeria in 2012 and has invested from Lagos ever since.
TCS | Dominic White and Adam Ely on AI agents going rogue
AI agents are no longer a thought experiment for security teams. They are breaking out of test environments, hacking real companies and, according to one of our guests, already going rogue inside large businesses.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, TechCentral deputy editor Fanie van Rooyen talks to Dominic White, MD for South Africa at Orange Cyberdefense, and Adam Ely, GM of AI security at
TCS | Octotel’s Trevor van Zyl on the fibre merger question
Octotel CEO Trevor van Zyl joins the TechCentral Show to talk about where South Africa’s fibre market goes next – including a potential merger with MetroFibre Networx. Van Zyl told TechCentral that Octotel and MetroFibre Networx are assessing a combination that would create the country’s third-largest fibre network operator, with both companies sitting under a common investor in an AIIM-led consor
Meet the CIO | Chris Shortt on what a supermarket becomes
Chris Shortt, chief technology officer at Shoprite Group, says the work of the next five years is meeting the customer at their point of need, wherever that is – and that this does not mean the end of the store.
Speaking on TechCentral’s Meet the CIO podcast series, brought to you by NTT DATA, Shortt said Africa’s largest retailer is building towards a unified experience regardless of how a custom
Watts & Wheels | Rubicon’s EV charging network is profitable – and growing fast
The company runs 125 chargers and wants a thousand within five years, focused on urban hubs.
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Rubicon’s public charging network is profitable and grew usage markedly in two months as fuel prices spiked, the company’s e-mobility head has told TechCentral’s Watts & Wheels.
Hilton Musk said usage climbed roughly 30% in a single month, then another 30% the month after. “We thought it was a fluke,” h
Watts & Wheels | Why electric trucks are beating electric cars to South Africa
South Africa has still not crossed 1% of new vehicle sales going to electric vehicles, well short of the 5% mark at which adoption typically accelerates, The Electric Mission executive director Hiten Parmar told TechCentral’s Watts & Wheels with Wills.
Parmar, who heads the non-profit advocacy body and co-founded the Southern African Electric Mobility Association, said the past three years have ch
Winstone Jordaan on building a national EV charging network
Winstone Jordaan was building charging infrastructure before South Africa had electric cars to plug into it. GridCars began developing its backend platform in 2010. The first EVs arrived in 2013.
In this episode of Watts & Wheels with Wills, the GridCars founder tells William Kelly why the hardware was never the hard part. Working out where to put a charger and how much power to feed it is straigh
Watts & Wheels S1E8: ‘Tesla lands in Africa, just not here’
Episode 8 of Watts & Wheels – TechCentral’s electric motoring show – opens with William Kelly on his soapbox, clipboard in hand, and a simple demand: keep left, pass right.
Too many South African drivers, he argues, treat the left indicator as an invitation to be overtaken rather than a signal of intent, and lane discipline would save the country time, fuel and a great deal of frustration, he opin
TCS | Herotel CEO Van Zyl Botha on beating Starlink to South Africa
Amazon’s Leo satellite constellation is coming to South Africa in 2027 through Herotel. TechCentral deputy editor Fanie van Rooyen speaks to Herotel CEO Van Zyl Botha about Evry, the brand that will sell Amazon Leo to South African homes, and about how a company with no local licence walked into a market that has kept Starlink out for years.
Botha explains why low-Earth orbit satellite technology
Meet the CIO | Derek Wilcocks on how AI personalised Vitality
Discovery group CIO Derek Wilcocks on personalised Vitality, the limits of AI coding and why growth beats cost-cutting.
Derek Wilcocks, group CIO at Discovery, says AI has finally given the group the ability to do something it has wanted to do since Vitality launched more than 25 years ago: personalise it.
Speaking on TechCentral’s Meet the CIO podcast series, brought to you by NTT DATA, Wilcocks
TCS | Money just became native to the internet - Steven Boykey Sidley
Steven Boykey Sidley has been a chief technology officer at a Fortune 500 company, a private equity investor, a videogame designer, a jazz musician and, for the past four years, a professor of practice at the University of Johannesburg. He is a partner at Bridge Capital, heading its futures advisory, and the author of eight books – two of them on bitcoin and crypto – with another due in October.
T
TCS+ | How AI is turning hardware into a subscription service
For most of business history, buying technology meant owning it. Capital was set aside, servers and laptops were hauled into the building alongside the software licences, and the business then sweated those assets for as long as it practically could.
In the age of AI, that logic is starting to break. Kit bought today can be obsolete in two or three years, chips are in short supply and the companie
TCS+ | iStore Business on why Apple makes sense for SMEs
For small and medium enterprises, technology must do one thing above all else: get out of the way. Unlike large corporations with dedicated IT departments, SMEs run lean – and every hour spent wrestling with systems is an hour not spent on the business itself.
In this episode of TechCentral’s TCS+, brought to you by iStore Business, Sudesh Pillay, executive head of iStore Business South Africa, an
TCS | Icasa's rules skip the real bottleneck: ACT
Communications regulator Icasa’s draft rapid deployment regulations – a critical intervention for the sector – risk failing unless the regulator brings municipalities into the process, according to Nomvuyiso Batyi, CEO of the Association of Comms & Technology (ACT).
Speaking on the TechCentral Show with TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod, Batyi said Icasa had consulted network operators and fibre co
TCS+ | A smarter approach to cloud for South African businesses
South African businesses are spending millions on cloud – and many have very little to show for it.
That is the uncomfortable starting point for this episode of TCS+, in which Nkosinathi Ndlovu speaks to Joel Chacko, executive head of department for cloud services at Vodacom Business, and Jonathan Oaker, founder and CEO of CloudZA, about why the promise of cloud still isn’t matching the reality fo
TCS | How Optasia lends billions to people banks can’t see
Optasia is on target to distribute more than US$6-billion in credit across its markets in 2026 – and it carries every cent of the default risk itself. In this episode of the TechCentral Show, CEO Salvador Anglada unpacks how the JSE’s biggest recent fintech listing actually works.
Formerly known as Channel VAS, Optasia was founded in 2012 as a single-country airtime credit provider. It listed on t
Everything you wanted to know about EVs but were afraid to ask
In the latest episode of Watts & Wheels with Wills, host William Kelly is joined in the studio by Greg Cress, automotive and e-mobility industry lead at Accenture South Africa, and Gary Scott of Scottify -- two of the longest-serving voices in South Africa's electric vehicle scene, and co-authors of a new guide to buying and owning an EV.
The guide was born of the basic questions that keep surfaci
Watts & Wheels with Wills: The rands-and-cents case for electric trucks
Aeversa’s John Ford unpacks the rands-and-cents case for electric trucks in this first of a new interview series.
TechCentral is proud to present the first episode of Watts & Wheels with Wills, our new interview show about electric vehicles and the fast-changing world of e-mobility in South Africa. In the debut episode, host William Kelly speaks to John Ford, sales manager at Aeversa, a fleet-foc
Watts & Wheels S1E7: 'Ferrari's EV breaks the internet'
Episode 7 of Watts & Wheels – TechCentral's electric motoring show – opens with mock outrage: the South African Car of the Year results are in, and the Alfa Romeo Junior didn't take the overall title. Hosts William Kelly and Duncan McLeod demand a recount – though they concede the Junior's best design win takes some of the sting out of a competition in which Chinese brands claimed half the categor
TCS | Pick n Pay’s Enrico Ferigolli on Penny, the AI that shops for you
Pick n Pay has switched on an AI shopping companion called Penny inside its asap! app, and in this episode of the TechCentral Show, retail executive for omnichannel Enrico Ferigolli takes editor Duncan McLeod through what it does and why it matters.
Built on Google's Gemini models, Penny lets customers build a grocery basket by asking for what they want in their own words – by voice, text or photo
TCS+ | How Tracker is turning vehicle data into business strategy
Vehicle tracking has come a long way from its origins as a stolen vehicle recovery tool. Today, the data generated by connected fleets – covering driver behaviour, fuel consumption, route efficiency and real-time events – has elevated telematics from an operational afterthought to a boardroom conversation.
In this episode of TCS+, host Nkosinathi Ndlovu sits down with Silvia Schollenberger, chief
TCS+ | IBM Bob: an AI-powered ‘development partner’ for the enterprise
It’s been roughly 18 months since AI researcher Andrej Karpathy coined the term “vibe coding” – using natural language alongside AI tools to write and deploy code – and the market for AI coding assistants has grown rapidly since. IBM’s entry into this space is Bob, an AI-powered development assistant built for enterprise environments.
In this episode of TCS+, Nathi Ndlovu speaks to David Spurway,
Watts & Wheels S1E6: ‘A flawless Alfa and a bakkie that divides’
Episode 6 of Watts & Wheels – TechCentral’s electric motoring show – sees hosts William Kelly and Duncan McLeod wade into the most opaque corner of the South African car market: tariffs, subsidies and what they really cost the people buying the cars.
William opens with a deep dive into why locally sold vehicles are priced the way they are, unpacking the difference between SKD (semi-knocked-down) a
Watts & Wheels S1E5: ‘A Bentley of the bush and a car that swims’
After a few months away, Watts & Wheels returns for the fifth episode of season 1, with William Kelly in studio and Duncan McLeod dialling in from the Southern Cape.
Watch episode 5 now
In episode 5, William and Duncan dive into:
• The new Suzuki Across, an entry-level SUV priced from R350 000 to R465 000 that squares up against Suzuki’s own Grand Vitara – and the welcome return of physical knobs
Meet the CIO | Absa CITO Johnson Idesoh on AI, cyber and the future of banking
Meet the CIO is brought to you by NTT DATA
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Johnson Idesoh, group chief information and technology officer at Absa, says AI in all its forms – generative, agentic and the AI now being wielded by cybercriminals – is the single biggest topic on his desk, but cautions that it remains a tool that has to be tied directly to business strategy and customer outcomes to deliver value.
Speaking on TechCen
TCS | Charge’s R1.8-billion bet on an off-grid EV future
South Africa has fewer than 400 public electric vehicle charging stations – up from zero just 15 years ago – and EV adoption remains stubbornly slow. Yet Charge, formerly known as Zero Carbon Charge, is betting big that a coast-to-coast network of off-grid, renewable-powered charging stations is exactly what’s needed to fire up the local market.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, Joubert Rou
TCS+ | The Up&Up Group on the hidden cost of AI
Companies large and small are pouring capital into AI projects, chasing the promise of efficiency, speed and scale. But as Jason Harrison, chief operating officer of The Up&Up Group, argues in this episode of TechCentral’s TCS+, the upfront price tag tells only a fraction of the story – and many South African boards are signing cheques without fully understanding what they’re buying.
Harrison uses
TCS+ | The retirement decision most South Africans get wrong
What happens to your retirement savings when you leave an employer is one of the most consequential financial decisions most South Africans will make – and one of the most commonly mishandled.
In this podcast conversation with Mpho Chitapi, 10X Investments senior investment consultant Michael Rossouw sets out what should happen, what often does, and where the costs lie.
When an employee resigns, t
TCS | The Cape Town start-up listening for TB with AI
AI Diagnostics, a Cape Town-based med-tech company that has built an AI-powered stethoscope designed to detect tuberculosis, recently raised R85-million in a pre-series-A funding round.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show (TCS), Nkosinathi Ndlovu speaks to the company’s CEO, Braden van Breda, about the funding round and its mission to transform TB screening across Africa and Asia.
The round, l
TCS+ | ‘The ISP for ISPs’: Vox’s shift to wholesale aggregator
Vox, a well-established retail internet service provider is expanding its services to the wholesale market through aggregation.
In this episode of TechCentral’s podcast series TCS+, Andre Eksteen, senior product manager for fibre to the business at Vox, discusses the rationale behind this strategy and the services Vox is offering as “the ISP for ISPs”.
Eksteen delves into:
• The thinking behind V
TCS | Werner Lindemann on how AI is rewriting the infosec rulebook
The pace at which artificial intelligence is reshaping the threat landscape is outstripping the ability of most organisations to defend themselves, with shadow AI, synthetic identity attacks and a looming quantum computing disruption all converging at once.
That’s the view of DataGroupIT CEO Werner Lindemann, who joined Duncan McLeod on the TechCentral Show to unpack what business leaders should b
TCS | Donovan Marsh on AI and the future of filmmaking
Award-winning South African film director Donovan Marsh has pivoted to artificial intelligence filmmaking and believes generative AI tools could fundamentally reshape how movies are made – and who gets to make them.
Marsh, whose 30-year career includes directing the Hollywood submarine thriller Hunter Killer starring Gerard Butler and Gary Oldman, the Spud films and iNumber Number, is the latest g
TCS+ | Vodacom Business moves to crack the SME tech gap
Everyone agrees that small and medium enterprises are the backbone of the South African economy. But the reality on the ground tells a different story – too many small businesses are still running on spreadsheets and WhatsApp, locked out of the tools that could help them compete.
In this episode of TCS+, TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod is joined in-studio by two members of the recently establishe
TCS | MTN’s Divyesh Joshi on the strategy behind Pi
MTN South Africa has launched Pi, a digital-only mobile operator that runs on MTN’s network but operates as a standalone brand, offering contract-free mobile and home 5G connectivity through a single app, with no call centres, no credit checks and no lock-in.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod talks to Divyesh Joshi, chief commercial officer at MTN South Afri
TCS | Anoosh Rooplal on the Post Office’s last stand
The South African Post Office has been in business rescue – a form of bankruptcy protection – since July 2023. Business rescue practitioners Anoosh Rooplal and Juanito Damons have made it clear to parliament that the entity will not survive liquidation unless a R3.8-billion bailout is received soon.
With some 5 500 jobs on the line, the big question is: is the Post Office worth saving? Rooplal spo
Meet the CIO | Healthbridge CTO Anton Fatti on the future of digital health
Anton Fatti, chief technology officer of HealthBridge, says the doctor-patient relationship must remain at the centre of digital transformation in healthcare, even as AI reshapes how medical practices operate.
Speaking on TechCentral’s Meet the CIO podcast series, brought to you by NTT DATA, Fatti said AI and cloud computing are already easing the administrative burden on doctors and medical profe
TCS+ | Arctic Wolf unpacks the evolving threat landscape for SA businesses
Most security teams can tell you what they've deployed. Far fewer can answer the board's next question: are we actually less exposed than we were three months ago?
In many organisations, the gap between security activity and real risk reduction remains stubbornly wide, even as threats become faster, more adaptive and harder to spot.
In this episode of TCS+, Clare Loveridge and Jason Oehley from Ar
TCS+ | Vox Kiwi: a wireless solution promising a fibre-like experience
Access to stable, reliable, high-speed internet is crucial to participating in the modern economy. Although fibre connectivity offers the highest speeds and reliability, fibre penetration rates unfortunately remain relatively low in South Africa, leaving may would-be customers wanting.
Vox recently launched Kiwi, a wireless connectivity solution promising a fibre-like experience with speeds of up
TCS+ | Flipping the narrative on AI in the Global South
In this thought-provoking episode of TechCentral's TCS+, Mpho Chitapi sits down with Dr Josefin Rosén, principal trustworthy AI specialist in SAS's Data Ethics Practice and co-author of the influential report Constraint to Capability: Flipping the Narrative on AI in the Global South.
What unfolds is a rich conversation that challenges long-held assumptions about Africa's role in the global AI ecos
TCS | Sink or swim? Antony Makins on how AI is rewriting the rules of work
Artificial intelligence isn’t just changing how work gets done, it’s rewriting the rules of business. Organisations are scrambling to redefine processes and job descriptions, while employees are grappling with new tools and new ways of thinking that are transforming the way they approach their daily tasks.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, Antony Makins, acting CEO at TForge and chair of th
Bolt ups the ante on platform safety
Safety is a core concern for e-hailing operators as it ensures that platforms engender trust among drivers, passengers and the general public. Bolt recently commissioned market research firm Ipsos to conduct research into the perceptions of rider safety in South Africa's e-hailing market.
In this episode of TechCentral's TCS+, Simo Kalajdzic, senior operations manager at Bolt South Africa, discuss
Meet the CIO | Inside the JSE’s tech engine with CIO Tebalo Tsoaeli
Technology sits at the heart of modern capital markets, and nowhere is that more evident than at the JSE. In the latest episode of Meet the CIO, TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod sits down with Tebalo Tsoaeli, the bourse’s CIO, to unpack how technology underpins Africa’s largest stock exchange – and how it is evolving for a more digital, global and real-time future.
Meet the CIO is brought to you b
TCS+ | Cloud On Demand and Consnet: inside a real-world AWS partner success story
The cloud revolution has challenged businesses of all sizes by changing how IT teams go about implementing projects and managing infrastructure. IT service firms have been doubly challenged, having to sell a new computing paradigm to their clients while also practising what they preach and adopting cloud-first technologies in-house.
Consnet is an IT solutions firm that leveraged the Amazon Web Ser
Watts & Wheels S1E3: ‘BYD’s Corolla Cross challenger’
TechCentral’s electric car show Watts & Wheels is back for episode 3 of season 1, and while EVs remain the focus, the conversation takes a detour into something far less planet-friendly – and far more jaw-dropping.
Duncan McLeod and co-host William Kelly kick off by drooling over a wild new Toyota performance machine they say is real, street legal and due in 2027. It’s a 4l hybrid V8, rear-wheel d
Watts & Wheels S1E2: ‘China attacks, BMW digs in, Toyota’s sublime supercar’
Chinese car makers continue their rapid push into the South African market, raising uncomfortable questions for incumbents. With aggressive pricing, fast product cycles and increasingly polished vehicles, the competitive landscape is shifting faster than many expected.
There is also an update on Stellantis’s manufacturing plans and what they could mean for South Africa’s position in global automot
TCS | BMW CEO Peter van Binsbergen on the future of South Africa’s automotive industry
South Africa’s automotive industry is in a state of flux. In this episode of the TechCentral Show, BMW Group South Africa CEO Peter van Binsbergen unpacks the challenges – and opportunities – facing a sector under pressure.
He tells TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod about the future of BMW’s Rosslyn manufacturing plant in Pretoria, which was established more than half a century ago, and the urgent
TCS+ | Why cybersecurity is becoming a competitive advantage for SA businesses
Cybersecurity is undergoing a quiet but important shift in South African boardrooms: from a defensive cost centre to a strategic business enabler. That was the central theme of a recent TechCentral TCS+ podcast discussion featuring Vodacom Business acting executive head for cloud security Lukhanyo Zahela and KnowBe4 Africa senior vice-president for content strategy Anna Collard.
Once seen primaril
Watts & Wheels S1E1 - 'William, Prince of Wheels'
TechCentral’s motoring show, Watts & Wheels, is officially back, with the first full episode of season 1 widening the lens beyond new cars to look at the forces reshaping South Africa’s automotive industry.
The first episode of season 1 – you can catch our “season 0” episodes here – opens with a sharp focus on South African Auto Week, where the pressure on local vehicle manufacturers dominated dis
TCS+ | Africa’s digital transformation – unlocking AI through cloud and culture
Africa’s digital transformation continues to accelerate, driven by growing cloud adoption and rising interest in artificial intelligence.
Yet many organisations still face challenges in converting these ambitions into measurable business outcomes. According to Cliff de Wit, group chief innovation officer at Accelera Digital Group, the success of AI-driven initiatives depends as much on culture and
TCS+ | How Cloud on Demand helps partners thrive in the AWS ecosystem
Newly minted small businesses often struggle to establish themselves as reliable service providers among their more established competitors. To help cloud-focused business thrive, Amazon Web Services has created the AWS distribution model to support small businesses and help them grow.
In this episode of TCS+, Cloud on Demand’s Xenia Rhode and Developmenthub’s Odwa Ndyaluvane explain how the AWS d
TCS | MTN Group CEO Ralph Mupita on competition, AI and the future of mobile
South Africa’s big three telecommunications operators have all reported numbers in recent weeks, and the theme is clear: competition in prepaid has intensified sharply.
Telkom’s resurgence has put pressure on both MTN and Vodacom, with MTN acknowledging it has “discernibly” lost prepaid market share.
This is one of the topics covered in this wide-ranging and exclusive TechCentral Show interview wi
TCS | Dominic Cull on fixing South Africa’s ICT policy bottlenecks
Returning to the TechCentral Show is ICT regulatory expert Dominic Cull, founder of Ellipsis and regulatory advisor to the Internet Service Providers’ Association. Cull recently attended communications minister Solly Malatsi’s policy colloquium in Pretoria – the first under a non-ANC communications minister.
Cull says there is a discernibly different tone from Malatsi compared to his predecessors:
Meet the CIO | How BDO’s Khaya Mbanga is preparing the firm for the AI future
Welcome to season 2 of Meet the CIO, TechCentral’s podcast series that dives into the minds of South Africa’s top technology leaders. Meet the CIO is brought to you by NTT DATA – where global experience meets local impact.
After a highly successful first season featuring CIOs from across the corporate landscape, we’re kicking off season 2 with a conversation with Khaya Mbanga, chief information an
TCS | BMW CEO Peter van Binsbergen on the future of South Africa’s automotive industry
South Africa’s automotive industry is in a state of flux. In this episode of the TechCentral Show, BMW Group South Africa CEO Peter van Binsbergen unpacks the challenges – and opportunities – facing a sector under pressure.
He tells TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod about the future of BMW’s Rosslyn manufacturing plant in Pretoria, which was established more than half a century ago, and the urgent
TCS | Why Altron is building an AI factory
Altron earlier this month announced that it has deployed an "AI factory" in one of Teraco’s new Johannesburg data centres. Powered by Nvidia AI infrastructure and software, the factory is has already gone live with half a dozen customers.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, Altron Group chief technology officer Bongani Andy Mabaso explains the rationale for the investment, what building the f
TCS+ | Videsha Proothveerajh on Vodacom Business’s new approach to enterprise technology
Vodacom Business recently appointed an “extraordinary business advisory board”, a strategic initiative designed to strengthen its enterprise expertise and support organisations on their digital transformation journeys.
To unpack the decision to appoint an advisory board, TechCentral is joined in this episode of TCS+ by Videsha Proothveerajh, director of Vodacom Business, who explains that it’s all
TCS | The company building a ‘living computer’ with human cells
The invention of the silicon transistor was fundamental to the success of the digital age, driving the core of the modern-day digital economy.
The rise of generative AI has put hardware at the epicentre of the next wave of economic growth, with chip makers such as Nvidia and AMD reaching record valuations as demand for advanced chips far outstrips supply.
But as AI data centres expand, so, too, do
TCS+ | Managing Sims, saving money: how MSB Micro keeps businesses connected
In today’s hyperconnected society, mobile connectivity is key to running a successful business, helping keep employees connected to each other, to organisational resources and to customers.
To manage communications effectively, businesses need to have a clear view of the entire Sim estate across the organisation. Monitoring usage and having the control needed to provide (or restrict) resources suc
TCS | Why South Africans are starting to spend crypto, not just trade it
Cryptocurrencies are increasingly moving beyond being seen as an investment asset as users find more real-world uses in everyday contexts. It appears that crypto is becoming more like cash – with users prepared to use it as the point of sale.
Crypto payments specialist MoneyBadger recently signed a deal with fintech Scan to Pay allowing crypto wallet users pay at more than 650 000 stores nationwid
TCS+ | Cloud On Demand's Senzo Mbhele on the benefits of the AWS distribution model
When most people think of Amazon Web Services, they automatically assume they should go directly to AWS. However, for the diverse ecosystem of AWS partners – including managed service providers and independent software vendors – the real secret to achieving significant growth often lies in leveraging the distributor model.
Consider this analogy: if AWS is a powerful cloud engine, then the reseller
TCS | Takealot CEO Frederik Zietsman on township growth, EVs and the future of online retail
E-commerce will soon reach an important milestone in South Africa: by January, according to World Wide Worx research, online shopping will top 10% of total retail sales for the first time. The move to 15% and then to 20% will come much quicker.
That’s the view of Frederik Zietsman, CEO of Naspers-owned Takealot Group – South Africa’s largest online retailer – who was speaking to TechCentral editor
TCS | Seacom 2.0: Alpheus Mangale unpacks all the details about the giant new subsea system
Seacom last week announced that it plans to build one of the highest-capacity subsea broadband cable systems the world has ever seen.
Dubbed Seacom 2.0, the cable system – which will have an expected design capacity of a staggering 2 000Tbit/s – will be larger than the company’s original system, which brought high-speed connectivity to Africa’s eastern coastline when it was launched in 2009.
The n
TCS | PayInc CEO Stephen Linnell on South Africa's payments revolution
South Africa’s payments ecosystem is evolving at a rapid pace. PayInc – previously BankservAfrica – sits at the core of the country’s payments infrastructure. As the builder and manager of the PayShap instant payment rails, PayInc is central to the Reserve Bank’s plans to drive digital inclusion through payment modernisation.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, Stephen Linnell, CEO of PayInc,
TCS+ | LSD Open: why repatriating from the cloud can be a costly mistake
Not every organisation that has migrated to the cloud has reaped the rewards promised in terms of faster development and deployment cycles, simplified infrastructure management, and most importantly, a reduction in costs.
Some are going as far as repatriating their infrastructure back into on-premises environments, perhaps because they understand it better and they find they can more reliably pred
TCS | From lockdown idea to global player: The Invigilator bags $11-million funding
The Invigilator, the developer of a South African application that helps educational institutions monitor web-based assessments to prevent cheating, recenty secured US$11-million (R195-million) in funding to help it expand internationally.
In this episode of the TechCentral Show, Nicolas Riemer, co-founder and CEO of The Invigilator, joins TechCentral’s Nkosinathi Ndlovu to discuss how the start-u
TCS + | HP’s AI future - how on-device intelligence is redefining work in Africa
AI has advanced at breakneck speed in the last few years, with most knowledge workers using the technology to enhance their work in some shape or form.
Most of this computing has been happening in the cloud. However, the advent of the neural processing unit, or NPU, has made it possible to move AI computation to the edge, which not only improves speeds but also protects personal and company data.
TCS | Barney Harmse on building Paratus Group – and working with Starlink
Paratus Group executive chairman Barney Harmse joins the TechCentral Show to share the story of the telecommunications group’s rise from small beginnings in Angola and Namibia more than 20 years ago and how it became one of Southern Africa’s biggest ICT infrastructure players.
Paratus started life in Angola in 2003, evolving from a local internet service provider into a pan‑African telecoms powerh
TCS | Maziv goes massive: CEO Dietlof Mare on Vumatel’s big roll-out plans
Maziv, the company that owns Vumatel and Dark Fibre Africa, plans to spend R12-billion over the next five years as its ramps its deployment of fibre infrastructure across South Africa.
Poised for a big injection of cash and assets from Vodacom, which is buying a 30% co-controlling stake in the business, it has unveiled big plans to deploy fibre in townships and other underserved parts of the count
TCS+ | Arctic Wolf on cybersecurity in the age of AI
What does it really take to defend a business in an era of AI-driven attacks?
In this episode of TechCentral’s TCS+ ,Clare Loveridge, vice president and GM for Europe, Middle East and Africa (Emea), and Johnny Ellis, senior director of Emea channel sales, both at Arctic Wolf, go beyond the buzzwords to confront the uncomfortable truth: despite billions spent on security tools, cyber losses are sti
TCS | The story behind Nedbank’s R1.65-billion iKhokha deal
Nedbank announced last week that it was acquiring Durban-based fintech iKhokha in a R1.65-billion deal that could signal the start of further consolidation in the payments industry in South Africa.
Nedbank described the deal as a “significant milestone” in its strategy to target small and medium enterprises.
iKhokha co-founder and CEO Matt Putman is TechCentral’s guest in this episode of the TechC
TCS+ | Kinetic Skunk: fintechs risk cloud bill shock without proper planning
Fintechs choose cloud technologies in the hopes that the efficiency and scalability of cloud computing will give them a competitive advantage. But cloud adoption is no silver bullet. If done incorrectly, a migration to the cloud can cause costs to balloon instead of decreasing them, leading to frustration and even lost revenue.
Kinetic Skunk is an Amazon Web Services-certified partner offering clo
TCS | Alan Knott-Craig unveils Fibertime’s big bet on township fibre
Alan Knott-Craig’s new fibre internet business has been flying below the radar for some time now, but the serial telecommunications entrepreneur has finally unpacked his plans for the business.
Speaking to the TechCentral Show this week, Knott-Craig – who has led a range of well-known tech businesses, including Mxit, World of Avatar, Project Isizwe and iBurst – talks about why he believes there’s
TCS | Pick n Pay’s Enrico Ferigolli on building asap! and taking on Shoprite
Although Shoprite Group stole a march on many of South Africa’s retailers in on-demand online grocery delivery during the Covid-19 lockdowns, Pick n Pay has a clear plan to make up lost ground and compete aggressively for market share.
Enrico Ferigolli, who co-founded the liquor delivery app Bottles – which was later acquired by Pick n Pay to form the basis of its online shopping push with asap! –
TCS+ | Cassava’s Adil El Youssefi on data centre growth in Africa
In this episode of TCS+, Adil El Youssefi, newly appointed CEO of the colocation business at Cassava Technologies and CEO of Africa Data Centres, chats about the challenges and opportunities in sub-Saharan Africa.
El Youssefi delves into:
• His background prior to being appointed into the role and how it has influenced his career as a technologist;
• His personal connection to the African contine
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