Being part of the South African global diaspora, and finally landing in the UK, I am personally fascinated by the outsized role that foreign-born technopreneurs play in startup economies all over the world. I  prefer to think of them as global citizens rather than the politically-charged word “im...

Technopreneurs will always find innovative ways of solving problems, but Africa’s Fintechs have to deal with, amongst other  things, a more difficult investment environment, issues with basic infrastructure, government regulation/taxes, and dominant African multi-nationals. We recently had ca...

Having co-founded and built startups in South Africa, Nigeria, Switzerland and Singapore, done business in Silicon Valley and countless  countries, I have decided that what I love most about the tech startup world is its universal language and values, wherever one goes. Now, as an advisor working w...

Insurtech as an industry sector has existed for less than a decade. Although it has dramatically changed in its nature, Insurtech has not fundamentally changed the insurance industry or its business models. This will inevitably happen in time. The first conference that we attended which even mention...

Potential investors see a red flag when the shareholding of the active founders/management is too low. This becomes even more difficult when it is as a result of dead shareholding. Investors will ask a filtering question early on in their evaluation process around the cap table. Their main objective...

“Shadow” or ex-officio director roles are often  established between institutional investors and their investee companies, whether intentional or unintentional,  with these roles having the same fiduciary responsibilities as actual directors.  We explain how these roles are sometimes establis...

In a world of spiralling government deficits, stubbornly high inflation, bank failures, fractured politics and gruesome wars wreaking economic as well as humanitarian havoc, it is little surprise that investors of all types have been seeking refuge in gold. The gold price has risen 19% in the last y...

We foresee a world of blockchain-enabled next-generation payment platforms outside of the SWIFT network, with businesses being able to move money globally, trading in both fiat and digital currencies, accepting payments in digital currencies and integrating digital currencies into products and servi...

Over the last decade, the subscription model has become a prominent feature across industries from streaming services, weekly meal kits, mobility services, to Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) – projected to be worth almost $1 trillion globally by 2028. As the subscription economy extends into new ...

Mezzanine finance is a hybrid debt equity instrument that is being increasingly used by technopreneurs around the globe, in different forms and use cases, as it is largely non-dilutative of their equity, usually does not require their personal surety and can be easier to acquire than either bank deb...