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Heard right? Hey, so you know we don’t get involved in politics, but the president of the US just said the F-word on camera. He’s not the first. Biden (2010, 2022), Bush and POTUSs from Grant and Truman to Nixon and Jimmy Carter all swore accidentally. Trump is the first to do so intentionally. Reminds us of that time (2022) Ramaphosa said “f-ol” in parliament.

Right now, though, we’re diving into SA’s 22 million pets and the tech to keep them united with their loving families…

South Africa is home to nearly 22 million pets… whose annual care, toys and treats inject a healthy R8 billion into the economy. But they don’t always stay put: Of the 100 pets separated from their owners that the Cape of Good Hope SPCA alone takes in every month, 90% are without pet identification. 

Some have collars, sure. Fewer are microchipped, despite SA having six active microchip companies. So, even if someone finds “Fluffy”, recovery depends on their goodwill, a nearby vet and the scanner actually working (and being registered with the right database).

The opportunity

A pet going missing is a traumatic experience, especially if you have small kids. And we all have a soft spot for the little furries, so you can bet there’s a 22 million-strong army of emotional South Africans willing to back a good way to keep them safe.

Just look at your local WhatsApp street groups, neighbourhood Facebook pages, and even Eskom Se Push to see how people rally around missing pets.

Who’s solving the problem

Microsoft for Startups partner Pet ConneX built SA’s first digital pet ID platform, replacing collars and microchips with a scannable, shareable, AI-powered ConneX ID profile, complete with images and unique traits of your pet, so they can be found and ID-ed fast.

It keeps your pet’s health records and training certificates, plus gives users access to special offers from 90+ B2B partners like retailers, trainers and vets. All supported by a smart AI chatbot that handles everything from lost-pet recovery to cat food recommendations.

Pet ConneX Founder Runveer Singh tells us that even armed response companies can use the platform to identify missing pets on patrols. Schweet.

🛒 Crypto Pay Jump. Since its launch in November 2024, Luno Pay has seen more than R20 million in payments processed through the platform, with as much as R2 million per month. South Africans have spent as little as R1 at PnP tills (although what for we’re not sure), right the way through to tens of thousands in high-value transactions. Goodness…

💰 Bank Zero’s Billion-Rand Exit. Seven years after launch, Lesaka Technologies just acquired Bank Zero for R1.1 billion. The bank attracted a loyal base of high-income earners and SMEs. Co-founder Michael Jordaan is staying on as chairman in a deal that includes cash, shares, and a 12% stake in Lesaka for Bank Zero.

🎾 Line AI. For the first time in Wimbledon’s 148-year history, there’ll be no line judges watching the action up close. Instead, the storied 300-odd line judges will be replaced by AI-powered live Electronic Line Calling to track ball movement and determine whether a ball is in or out. The Crown Jewel of Tennis starts on Monday, 30 June.

🤑 AI Tax Man. SARS has put out a Request for Information (RFI) for an advanced AI system featuring “digital twinning” capabilities to support automated decision-making, aimed at enhancing tax collection efforts. Just when you thought they’d maxed out what they could squeeze…

🇿🇦 Shop SA. Proudly South African has just launched an e-commerce platform to provide support for locally manufactured goods and services: Shop Proudly SA. Get your hands on everything from Baby Food to Homeware, Toys and Games to supplements, even smelling salts and a windscreen repair kit. Lekker man.

✅ The Stack. Founders need tools and suppliers they can trust. Check out our Founder’s Stack with your own CFO for a fraction of the cost with OCFO, 90% off your first 6 months’ accounting with Xero, plus loads more vital startup tools & services.

“I’m spending all this money to get people to my store — and I’m still losing sales I didn’t even know about.”

That’s exactly where South African startup Talk360 found themselves — until they partnered with Njiapay, and saw a 25% increase in checkout conversion across Africa.

Africa has the highest cart abandonment rate in the world. Most small online businesses rely on a single PSP. If that provider fails or doesn’t support local banks or currencies, you lose the sale silently.

Talk360 operates across fragmented markets, with dozens of currencies, poor connectivity and differing financial systems. They didn’t want to hire a payments team, so they plugged into Njiapay.

“It wasn’t our product that was failing — it was payments,” said their COO.

“Njiapay gave us a payments team, expert support, and the results speak for themselves.”

✅ Smart routing to trusted payment methods
✅ A single API for all African markets
✅ Real-time checkout optimisation based on location, currency, and behaviour

If you’re doing 100+ orders a month and can’t afford to lose another customer at checkout, this is your highest-leverage fix.

“I finally feel in control — without burning out or hiring a team.”

Njiapay is offering a free payments benchmark analysis — they’ll show you exactly where your checkout is leaking money, and how to fix it.

_{*This content is part of a paid partnership with NjiaPay.}

Next up in our members-only founder network — The Founder Collab.

27 June 12:00 — Business Value Masterclass: Come get the inside track on strategies to increase your business’s value, straight from the experts with Graham Stephen from bizval.

11 July 12:00 — Business Automation Masterclass: Come learn how to automate your entire business from day one with Theunis Duminy from the automation pros at Vertiqal.

25 July 12:00 — The Art of Execution Masterclass: Learn to bridge vision and reality by turning your strategy into results with 7 proven disciplines and a scalable leadership Ops System by Jason Goldberg, Art of Scale author and co-founder of Edge Growth.

PLUS: When you join The Founder Collab get access to expert sessions, more than 100 SA founders to network with and weekly online and offline network engagements.

🤳🏼Customer Support @ Jem

🤝 Sales Manager @ Diggsconnect

📋 Product Manager @ LexisNexis

🏗️ Senior Backend Engineer @ MoonPay

✏️ UI/UX Designer @ Absa Group

📢 Senior Digital Campaign Manager @ Flash Group

Hiring? Get in touch, and we will feature it here.

Last Tuesday, we asked what actually happens in group gift chats, and some poor schlub always gets saddled with the responsibility…

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💸 Someone suggests cash… no one follows through. (11%)

🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 🏏 One poor soul buys the gift and becomes the debt collector. (74%)

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🧦 Three people buy the same thing. Again. (0)

🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🥴 We all chip in… chaos still reigns. (14%)

⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🚪 Someone leaves the group and just brings a card. (3%)