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More info here.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Rival Industrial buys Bundublog
Niche market industrial publishing company Rival Industrial has purchased local blogging platform Bundublog effective 1 April 2009.
Bundublog is a South African focused free blogging community with around 130 active blogs with bloggers from South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya and Nigeria. Currently the site enjoys about 8000 unique visitors each month.
Rival Industrial owns stakes in niche market industrial titles including ManufacturingHub.co.za and Ferronews.com as well as remedial and special education website RemSpecED.
Marc Ashton speaking on behalf of Rival Industrial said: "The transaction serves two purposes for us - firstly it allows us to aggregate some of our niche content to a wider audience which helps us generate advertising revenue and secondly it ties in with our longer term strategy of developing an audience for syndicated internet radio content."
According to Ashton, more and more South Africans are taking to blogging.
He said: "Every day new blogs are being added to the aggregators, small businesses who can't afford a web presence are suddenly being given a free tool through which to market themselves and ordinary citizens on the ground in places like South Africa, Zimbabwe and Nigeria are able to connect with the world and give us real-time feedback of events on the ground - it's seriously powerful if we can find ways to harness it correctly."
While the site will continue to focus on Africa, some changes are also planned to build the Bundublog experience including:
- Development of podcasts from bloggers
- Music platform for upstart South African bands to promote their talent
- A science and technology platform, in conjunction with ManufacturingHub.co.za aimed at skills development in this sector
Ashton concludes: "We're excited about the opportunity we've been presented by taking over Bundublog and we look forward to welcoming a whole host of new bloggers to the platform."
About the company
Rival Industrial is a Gauteng based corporate wellness, industrial research and publishing investment company.
The company holds stakes in ManufacturingHub.co.za - an online publication aimed at the South African food, pharmaceutical, chemical and cosmetic manufacturing industries - as well as Ferronews.com which provides information on the ferrous metal industries in Africa.
Other investments include RemSpecED, a remedial and special education portal aimed at parents, teachers and therapists.
For further information
Tel: 082-561-1585
E-mail: webmaster@rival.co.za
www.rival.co.za
http://bundublog.com/
Bundublog is a South African focused free blogging community with around 130 active blogs with bloggers from South Africa, Zimbabwe, Kenya and Nigeria. Currently the site enjoys about 8000 unique visitors each month.
Rival Industrial owns stakes in niche market industrial titles including ManufacturingHub.co.za and Ferronews.com as well as remedial and special education website RemSpecED.
Marc Ashton speaking on behalf of Rival Industrial said: "The transaction serves two purposes for us - firstly it allows us to aggregate some of our niche content to a wider audience which helps us generate advertising revenue and secondly it ties in with our longer term strategy of developing an audience for syndicated internet radio content."
According to Ashton, more and more South Africans are taking to blogging.
He said: "Every day new blogs are being added to the aggregators, small businesses who can't afford a web presence are suddenly being given a free tool through which to market themselves and ordinary citizens on the ground in places like South Africa, Zimbabwe and Nigeria are able to connect with the world and give us real-time feedback of events on the ground - it's seriously powerful if we can find ways to harness it correctly."
While the site will continue to focus on Africa, some changes are also planned to build the Bundublog experience including:
- Development of podcasts from bloggers
- Music platform for upstart South African bands to promote their talent
- A science and technology platform, in conjunction with ManufacturingHub.co.za aimed at skills development in this sector
Ashton concludes: "We're excited about the opportunity we've been presented by taking over Bundublog and we look forward to welcoming a whole host of new bloggers to the platform."
About the company
Rival Industrial is a Gauteng based corporate wellness, industrial research and publishing investment company.
The company holds stakes in ManufacturingHub.co.za - an online publication aimed at the South African food, pharmaceutical, chemical and cosmetic manufacturing industries - as well as Ferronews.com which provides information on the ferrous metal industries in Africa.
Other investments include RemSpecED, a remedial and special education portal aimed at parents, teachers and therapists.
For further information
Tel: 082-561-1585
E-mail: webmaster@rival.co.za
www.rival.co.za
http://bundublog.com/
Saturday, March 7, 2009
AI and Venture Cap
Is quality "Artificial Intelligence" the way that search engines - Google / Yahoo / a new player - are likely to monetise their offerings in coming years?
The Internet is likely to be home to a number of Artificial Intelligence based technologies in coming years - simply because it is so big and unwieldly at the moment.
You think about how much information there is out there, so many sources and opinions and different levels of credibility for the information you read. How do you rank it?
How do you say that the information coming from Source A is more valuable than the information coming from Source B?
Even in professional social networks, forums and message boards - how do you rank the contributions made by the various posters?
Google is on a mission to put every book ever published on the internet, add in blogs, dissertations, conference papers etc - and there is so much GOOD information on the web that a user has little chance of identifying the salient points of any debate and trying to work out what information they need to know without extensive digging.
As more and more niche market social networking offerings come online - I suspect users will be able to not only pick the brains of human industry experts - but also leverage off Artificial Intelligence to find the info they are looking for.
The idea is way to big for a simple person like me to get my head around, but I'm wondering if this isn't the "next generation" of earnings for a company like Google. Where we presently have a simple "SEARCH" function / toolbar which we can add to our sites to help us monetise our offerings, I'm wondering if Google won't look at:
1. Ask an expert a question or
2. "Super AI Search" functionality
Basically a user would be able to use the toolboxes but for a far larger fee be able to draw up high quality information off the web hitting up an army of Artificial Intelligence applications to find the information you require.
The functionality could be the same in terms of posting widgets into boxes but instead of using Google Ads or the Search boxes, these would be replaced by these smarter widgets? It would be a good way to leverage off these massive blogging platforms and networks that are growing rapidly and looking for ways to monetise their offerings.
Anybody got ideas on how much progess has been made in terms of AI in the search-engine space? Are there moves afoot to be able to develop these offerings?
Any South African companies making moves in this part of the AI industry space?
Source: www.aiblog.iblog.co.za
The Internet is likely to be home to a number of Artificial Intelligence based technologies in coming years - simply because it is so big and unwieldly at the moment.
You think about how much information there is out there, so many sources and opinions and different levels of credibility for the information you read. How do you rank it?
How do you say that the information coming from Source A is more valuable than the information coming from Source B?
Even in professional social networks, forums and message boards - how do you rank the contributions made by the various posters?
Google is on a mission to put every book ever published on the internet, add in blogs, dissertations, conference papers etc - and there is so much GOOD information on the web that a user has little chance of identifying the salient points of any debate and trying to work out what information they need to know without extensive digging.
As more and more niche market social networking offerings come online - I suspect users will be able to not only pick the brains of human industry experts - but also leverage off Artificial Intelligence to find the info they are looking for.
The idea is way to big for a simple person like me to get my head around, but I'm wondering if this isn't the "next generation" of earnings for a company like Google. Where we presently have a simple "SEARCH" function / toolbar which we can add to our sites to help us monetise our offerings, I'm wondering if Google won't look at:
1. Ask an expert a question or
2. "Super AI Search" functionality
Basically a user would be able to use the toolboxes but for a far larger fee be able to draw up high quality information off the web hitting up an army of Artificial Intelligence applications to find the information you require.
The functionality could be the same in terms of posting widgets into boxes but instead of using Google Ads or the Search boxes, these would be replaced by these smarter widgets? It would be a good way to leverage off these massive blogging platforms and networks that are growing rapidly and looking for ways to monetise their offerings.
Anybody got ideas on how much progess has been made in terms of AI in the search-engine space? Are there moves afoot to be able to develop these offerings?
Any South African companies making moves in this part of the AI industry space?
Source: www.aiblog.iblog.co.za
Tuesday, February 24, 2009
Absa Capital Private Equity and Vantage Capital acquire Kwikspace
Absa Capital further underscored its private equity credentials today when a consortium of private equity investors, co-led by Absa Capital Private Equity (Pty) Ltd (Absa Capital Private Equity) and Vantage Capital Group (Pty) Ltd (Vantage Capital), announced that they had acquired the entire issued ordinary share capital of the JSE-listed Kwikspace Modular Buildings Ltd (Kwikspace).
The consortium comprises Absa Capital Private Equity, Vantage Capital and certain members of the Kwikspace management team.
The offer - R8 a share for a total consideration of R683 m – was made to acquire the entire issued ordinary share capital of Kwikspace, excluding those shares held by Vantage Capital and certain other shares held by the current management team.
Andre Pieterse, CEO of Absa Capital Private Equity, said that he was delighted to acquire Africa’s largest and most diverse manufacturer of factory-built modular homes, clinics, offices and classrooms.
“The offer was implemented by way of a scheme of arrangement between Kwikspace and its shareholders, other than Vantage and Kwikspace management, in terms of section 311 of the Companies Act,” said Pieterse.
Mutle Mogase, Vantage Capital’s director on the board of Kwikspace commented: “We have a long-standing relationship with the company which dates back to 2006 when we first acquired a 30% shareholding as BEE investor. This buyout represents a new and exciting phase in this relationship.”
All conditions precedent to the scheme were fulfilled and the scheme consideration was paid to shareholders on Monday, 23 February 2009.
The listing of Kwikspace shares was terminated at the commencement of today’s trading.
Kwikspace has been building a wide variety of modular building units for more than 30 years and exporting to many parts of Africa, South America and the Middle East - supplying customers in the private, industrial, commercial and government sectors.
Kwikspace has factories in Johannesburg, Durban and Cape Town, with sales offices situated in most major cities throughout the country.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Reinet invests in SynthaSite
SynthaSite, the leading online Web site builder, today announced it has secured $20 million in Series B financing from Luxembourg-based Reinet Fund S.C.A. The company plans to use the capital to accelerate the development of its Web site creation tools and its peer-to-peer e-commerce platform through organic growth and strategic acquisitions in both its San Francisco and Cape Town, South Africa locations.
In a tough economic environment, SynthaSite raised $20 million in the company's second round of financing. By making it easy for anyone to build and host a Web site, the company has grown its customer base to over one million registered users since raising its $5 million Series A round in November 2007. SynthaSite prioritizes its development based on user feedback and has recently introduced a number of new features including an enhanced user interface, 60,000+ widgets, domain registration, shopping cart features and a blogging platform.
"We believe in providing the best possible experience for everyday people building Web sites. On top of that foundation, we have built a very scalable business model focused on generating revenue via value added services and partner relationships. Reinet shares our vision and we appreciate their strong support," said Vinny Lingham, CEO of SynthaSite.
"What sets SynthaSite apart is its vision and management team," said Frank Vivier, Chief Investment Officer of Reinet Investment Advisors. "The team's unique combination of technology, business expertise and proven track record make me confident that this company will be a big success story. Great companies are built during turbulent times."
"SynthaSite is maturing according to plan," said Johann Rupert, Executive Chairman of Reinet Investments S.C.A. "This next phase of execution will be both challenging and interesting and Reinet and SynthaSite together form a strong partnership to meet those challenges."
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
Web entrepreneurs
Hello entrepreneurs... I've had a request from one of our readers to sound out SA web players.
They are looking to take full or partial stakes in some decent entry level SA web properties.
They would prefer pre or post revenue properties - i.e. sites or communities that are generating some revenue or are generating a decent level of quality traffic would definately be of consideration.
Sectors of interest include:
- Science
- Technology
- Finance
- Manufacturing
- Mining
- Industrial
- Business
If you believe you have a web project that needs infrastructure, resources, investment or are looking to exit their investment please mail a motivation to marc@rival.co.za with some details of the project.
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Observation
A small observation on the blog post below.
We had quite a few responses for people looking for amounts of between R250k and R1.5m and quite a lot looking for small web based ventures or to kick-start IT businesses.
Had one very good suggestion in the "energy" sector which we're now planning to take a closer look at, but other than that no real BIG projects or suggestions....
I guess it found it very odd, that there are many smaller more "functional" entrepreneurs and fewer looking for some really big and bold projects... Wonder why that is??
We had quite a few responses for people looking for amounts of between R250k and R1.5m and quite a lot looking for small web based ventures or to kick-start IT businesses.
Had one very good suggestion in the "energy" sector which we're now planning to take a closer look at, but other than that no real BIG projects or suggestions....
I guess it found it very odd, that there are many smaller more "functional" entrepreneurs and fewer looking for some really big and bold projects... Wonder why that is??
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