Is Cape Town the best city in South Africa to start a tech business?
Google invests a whopping R2.2-billion into the Western Cape economy.
If you want to start a technology startup you need three important ingredients:
- A great idea - yes, you'll need to start off with an excellent idea as to how you are going to create and scale value exponentially.
- A lot of money - tech startups are highly capital intensive; you need a lot of cash to plow into development, hardware and marketing.
- You need to attract great talent - tech companies are built by smart expensive, highly-skilled people who are being offered jobs and opportunities all over the world.
On the last point - if you can be headquartered in a beautiful city, that has world-class infrastructure, a functioning regional government, affordable housing and recreational options - then it's far easier to attract and retain the all-important talent that you are paying such a huge amount for.
When that city is also able to convince Google to invest R2.2 billion into improving fibre optics into the region - vastly accelerating the speed of connectivity and reducing its overall price - then why would you consider any other place on the African continent for that matter.
'Five notable investments were announced at the presidential investment summit into the Western Cape, notably by Google, Amdec, Capita, Lactalis, and Teraco. According to reports, collectively all the investors have committed to an investment of R7.8-billion into the province.'
Amazon Web Services [AWS] already employs hundreds of highly-skilled people at their regional offices in Gardens so the news of these new investments into the local technology industry is really great.
'Aside from positively contributing to economic growth and job creation, the investment bodes well for investor confidence, setting a bar that encourages international and local investors to contribute to the Mother City.'
Ashleigh Klein
