Author: Contributor

Do you love working with numbers? Does big data excite you? Are you interested in joining the biggest retail enterprise in Africa? Then sign up for an apprenticeship at the Shoprite Group’s Data Science Academy. Applications for the January 2020 intake are open from now until the end of September 2019. Data science is a multidisciplinary field that combines mathematics, statistics and computer science to automatically extract knowledge and insights from large amounts of data for the purposes of improved decision making. At the Shoprite Group data sets involve sales, inventory, consumer spending and much more. The Shoprite Group consists…

by Ben Dickson As online trolling and hate speech are becoming more problematic, companies like Facebook and Twitter are under increasing pressure to identify and block hateful speech on their networks. And like many other problems that involve the massive amounts of online content, these companies have turned to artificial intelligence for solutions. All major social media networks use AI algorithms to moderate online content. But while AI shows promise in detecting some type of content, it is hard pressed when it comes to spotting hate speech. A recent study by scientists at University of Washington, Carnegie Mellon University, and Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence, has…

Raising money is tough for all founders, especially if they are operating in a tough market like South Africa. Tamela Capital Partners, however, aims to change this. Tamela Capital Partners, a Sandton-based independent fund manager, wants to finance mid-market companies who wish to grow their businesses, enter new markets and accelerate growth through expanding operations or consummating strategic acquisitions. The fund manager, which is owned by of Tamela Holdings, has announced today that the Tamela Mezzanine Debt Fund 1 has reached R420 million. Tamela Holdings has advised some of the largest empowerment deals in South AFRICA – including MTN’s R9…

by Max Eiza Driving long distances without a passenger can be lonely. If you’ve ever done it, you might have wished for a companion to talk to – someone emotionally intelligent who can understand you and help you on the road. The disembodied voice of SatNav helps to fill the monotonous silence, but it can’t hold a conversation or keep you safe. Research on driverless cars is well underway, but less is heard about the work being done to make cars a smart companion for drivers. In the future, the cars still driven by humans are likely to become as…

by Willem Fourie Earlier this year, 17 African countries presented their progress on reaching the Sustainable Development Goals, or SDGs, at the United Nations. There was some good news and progress. But it’s clear that radical interventions are still required if countries on the continent are to achieve these ambitious global development goals. Technology will be key in any such interventions. Doubling agricultural productivity (Goal 2), halving road deaths (Goal 3), increasing water efficiency (Goal 6), doubling the rate of improvement in energy (Goal 7), and halving food waste (Goal 12), among others, seem impossible without game-changing innovations and dramatic…

Standard Bank Mobile, South Africa’s newest mobile network, has expanded its service offering to allow customers to purchase Apple, Samsung and Huawei smartphone devices with a ‘convenient’ financing option. The Bank has introduced an ‘innovative’ way to acquire a smartphone by financing devices over 24 months using an extended payment facility on Standard Bank credit card accounts.  This facility is offered at a special interest rate of 11% per annum. Customers can call in to request a limit increase if required. Standard Bank believes that the only way to enter a crowded telecommunications market is by offering additional value to…

by David Evans Bailey Immortality has been a topic of discussion since the legend of the Holy Grail. Some people have gone as far as cryogenic freezing after death in the hope that one day science will have advanced enough to resurrect them. Others believe the route to immortality lies in the digital realm. The theory that humans can be digitised and live on within the digital confines of a computer-based existence has been the subject of debate. But until recently, no one had taken the idea much beyond research and discussion. Last year, a consortium of unidentified individuals launched…

by Wim Naudé The invention of an artificial super-intelligence has been a central theme in science fiction since at least the 19th century. From E.M. Forster’s short story The Machine Stops (1909) to the recent HBO television series Westworld, writers have tended to portray this possibility as an unmitigated disaster. But this issue is no longer one of fiction. Prominent contemporary scientists and engineers are now also worried that super-AI could one day surpass human intelligence (an event known as the “singularity”) and become humanity’s “worst mistake”. Current trends suggest we are set to enter an international arms race for…

South African developers wanting to make a mark in the growing app development or the IoT spaces are invited to submit their original tech solutions for consideration for this year’s editions of the MTN Business App of the Year Awards and IoT Conference & Awards. These awards celebrate the talent and out-of-the-box thinking aimed at driving disruption and change. Historically, the events have been attended by more than 800 delegates including captains of industry, key ICT stakeholders, developers, MTN partners and other business leaders in the technology sector. The winners of the respective competitions, which will both be held at…

by Alison Gillwald South Africa is caught up in the global hype of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR). This is distracting it from the unfinished business of redressing inequality and creating the preconditions for an inclusive digital economy and society. Reinvented by Klaus Schwab of the World Economic Forum (WEF), 4IR technologies are presented as having the potential to propel digitally-ready countries into a new age of unprecedented economic prosperity. The Forum’s appropriation of the concept has arguably been one the most successful lobbying and policy influence instruments of our time. Mobilising around the elite annual gathering in Davos, the…