Google’s David Drummond Visits 88mph

October 22nd, 2013

Last week 88mph Cape Town was fortunate enough to host Google’s David Drummond. (Just Google him. No irony intended ;)

For someone of his stature to visit South Africa, and to take an interest in Africa in general, is quite something. He could have sent any one of his 50,000 employees. Instead he came down on his own to explore first hand the opportunities and challenges that we face on a daily basis.

From left to right – Chris (88mph), Hannes (Visa), Fortune (Google), Dan (88mph), Simone (Google), David (Google), Pieter (Remgro) and Alex (Silicon Cape / Invenfin)

David Drummond and team in Board Room

Steve from MyDoorHandle explains how his startup works…

Rupert from Zapacab persuades David to only ever use Zapacabs!

Everyone beavering away on their startups.

88mph’s portfolio company goes public

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88mph portfolio company, Mdundo is listed on the Nasdaq First Growth Market in Denmark

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88mph invests in Ahoy

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88mph is taking a break from investing in startups

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Exciting news from 88mph 2013 alumni startup, ApexPeak

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When Gakim Solomons brought ApexPeak to us 2 years ago, he wanted to build a smarter system that could provide SME’s with short-term capital. He explained the system the banks were using, which was needlessly inefficient and expensive, leaving many businesses under-serviced, and incapable of growing their businesses.

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Who are the DealWeek investors?

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As we’ve gathered quite a range of founder-investors to join us for a week of evaluating and investing in startups, we thought you might like to know who they are, what they have done, and what types of startups they are looking to put their hard-earned cash into.

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Why we are doing things a little different in 2015

January 7th, 2015

We may lose some of benefits of the longer accelerator model, but given all the upsides we’ve mentioned here, we believe it’s worth a shot. So here goes the first test.

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Introducing 88mph DealWeek Cape Town 2015

January 5th, 2015

DealWeek is a 1-week sprint for 88mph and entrepreneurs turned investors to advise and invest in the most promising startups, where those selected to participate can receive between $25k and $250k.

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23m USD export finance deal with ApexPeak

September 18th, 2014

South African citrus fruit grower Karu Exporters, a subsidiary of the Bonaire Group, closed a US$23 million export finance deal with ApexPeak in August 2014.

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Ekaya Press Release – September 2014

September 17th, 2014

They have been a little quiet for the last 2 months while they’ve been hard at work behind the scenes. Today they’re finally able to start sharing the fruits of that labor with you.

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BookNow is hiring

September 10th, 2014

It’s been an exciting one year for BookNow, they are growing as per their laid down targets, and they are now approaching the next phase in their growth strategy. In the next 3 months or so they are seeking to fill two C-level positions: Chief Marketing Officer & Chief Finance Officer. They are searching for kick ass individuals, who will…

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Startup Designers – what do they do, and why is it important?

May 23rd, 2014

It’s difficult to ignore that designers have a massive role to play in the evolution of the web and the next generation of web products. Designers have co-founded startups like Kickstarter and Airbnb, and it was a designer who made the smartphone experience as memorable as it is today.

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The launch of 440 – a joint venture between 88mph and L5Lab

March 2nd, 2014

88mph has teamed up with L5 Lab to bring early-stage investing to Nigeria. Having run 5 rounds of funding and now into our 4th accelerator program, we are scaling the model to Africa’s biggest, and possibly most challenging, market. Why did we choose to bring our model to Nigeria? Well, anyone who has been to…

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How Do We Pick Our Startups?

January 27th, 2014

Right now we are sending out acceptance offers for the Cape Town 2014 program, as well as the rejection notes to those who didn’t make it through. To beat you to it… Here’s the inside scoop as most of you will try and contact us to find out why you didn’t make it. 1st off,…

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Thinking Of Applying For The Cape Town 2014 Program?

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Do you have a mobile/web business idea that needs funding? Thinking of applying to our 2014 accelerator program in Cape Town? We’re having an open evening for potential applicants who want to know some of the finer detail. If that’s you, please come along. Thursday 5th Dec Here at our office in Woodstock, Cape Town…

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In 2011, 88mph made our first investments in Africa in connection with an investment event. The format was to invest in minimum one startup – only 48 hours after meeting them for the first time. We had received 60-70 applications online, and cut that down to the 10 who would come to this 48-hour event.…

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The Cape Town Accelerator Program

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What is an Accelerator Program? or Seed Fund? When does it start? How does it work…? So many questions… but before we start, make sure you’ve read the Home Page thoroughly, watched the video and read these FAQs. Then ask yourself: Do I have a scalable mobile or web business idea that can service Africa?…

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Nairobi startup, Gamsole, hits it big on Windows phone

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Gamsole from the 2012 class in Nairobi hits it big with a #1 position on Free Games on windows marketplace. Gamsole has firmly established itself as the #1 African game studio with millions of games downloaded for windows phone and now a latest achievement of reaching the top of the pop list on the marketplace.…

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Forget passion & f**k goals. Find a process instead.

October 15th, 2013

The creator of Dilbert tosses out accepted ideas on how to reach success and introduces some of his own.

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Congrats to 88mph alumni Apex Peak.

September 26th, 2013

Apex Peak, one of the startups to get funding from 88mph through our first Cape Town program, have just officially announced the follow-on rounds they’ve secured since 88mph’s demo day earlier this year. The Apex Peak platform offers an alternative way for businesses to get access to short term financing. There is a huge demand…

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Samsung Partnership: Startups Get Chance to End up on Millions of Phones

July 18th, 2013

As a startup accelerator, we want to attract the best talent there is. Simple as that. By joining us, startups get investment, access to a built-in team of pro’s with uber skillz from coding to biz dev, a network of investors to call on for follow-on funding and marketing muscle. Most recently we’ve increased our…

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