The sky’s no limit as space age SA technology reaps awards at Western Cape innovation showpiece
Proudly South African satellite components now orbiting the earth, a world-first recycled plastic bucket, and a new kind of ‘carbon-friendly’ cement.
These are just some of numerous home-grown innovations to scoop top honours on Tuesday night at the Western Cape Innovation Awards hosted by the Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
A total of 14 innovation awards across four separate categories paid tribute to South African innovators, big and small, driving economic growth in the Western Cape. The annual awards also seek to promote innovation as a cornerstone of the province’s successful Growth for Jobs strategy.
“Innovation is the magic ingredient that drives us forward - our innovators are our trailblazers,” commented Cape Chamber chief executive John Lawson. “The more we celebrate our innovators, the more we inspire future innovators to develop their ideas and chase progress.”
A notable winner was Stellenbosch entrepreneur Mike Kearney from Cubespace, a space tech company now manufacturing satellite control systems for global clients, including the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). The satellite control systems are helping revolutionise a huge range of services, from wildfire monitoring to virtual medical consultations in remote locations. “We are completely changing the game,” said Kearney in a video interview screened at Tuesday’s event. “Our customers now need to be able to build satellites quick enough and cheap enough to be able to make a business model.”
Locally produced satellite control systems were significantly cheaper than US or European-made equivalents, Kearney said. “There’s a huge opportunity in South Africa if you can build a high-tech company that exports. The South African market is relatively small. We have great engineers and loads of amazing tech, and our manufacturing is low cost.
“I’m very optimistic about what we can do in South Africa if we realise that we can compete globally very easily - and we have huge advantages over European and American companies,” Kearney said.
Other award-winning entrepreneurs included Professor Johann Kirsten from the Bureau for Economic Research who has spearheaded a certification system for Karoo Lamb, and Johan Coetzee whose company Zerocrete is pioneering a new kind of low-carbon concrete made from non-recyclable plastic and fabrics. “It came to me that I must change the whole DNA of concrete,” Coetzee said of his innovation. “We started out completely replacing the sand and stone.” His team also uses a new kind of binder, with the end result being a new concrete product with 80% less carbon footprint.
“People think that with waste you will have a sub-standard product…but the quality of the end result is even better,” Coetzee.
Award winners also included public servants involved with a range of innovative public-funded programmes, such as the City of Cape Town’s Ease of Doing Business Programme, and the Western Cape’s Growth for Jobs Programme.
There were also awards for civil society programmes run by NGOs, including affordable housing specialists Development Action Group, and the Peninsula School Feeding Association that has served over two billion meals in the Western Cape over its 67-year lifespan.
Event sponsors included FNB, the City of Cape Town, Heineken, the Cape Higher Education Consortium, In-House venue technical management, and Tsebo Solutions.
FNB WCape Commercial head Stephan Claasen said South Africa was poised for sustained economic growth, buoyed by significant investor appetite from both Chinese and US firms. He said innovation would be the key to capitalising on the coming economic up-cycle.
Jacques Moolman
President of the Cape Chamber of Commerce and Industry