Big chance for IT whizzes
A former chairman of software company SAP has done it again.
German national Hasso Plattner has launched yet another venture capital fund – now for Africa.
Worth a whopping R350m, Hasso Plattner Ventures Africa invites information technology innovators to get their fingers going to produce programmes that are patentable and a good selling proposition.
Plattner is the owner of Fancourt, the exclusive golf estate in George in the Southern Cape. He’s backed by German giant MAN Ferrostaal, a global provider of industrial services.
This comes in the wake of a huge push by the government to induce South Africans to export more, as indicated by minister of finance Trevor Manuel in his budget speech last week.
It is an opportunity for another South African to shake the IT world like Mark Shuttleworth did half a decade ago.
It is the second such fund Plattner has founded. Three years ago he started Hasso Plattner Ventures Europe and it was on the strength of this runaway success that an Africa division was started.
The fund will be biased in favour of telecommunications, mobile applications, media and software, as well as clean technology investments such as renewable energy, energy-saving concepts and similar business segments. Activities will be focussed predominantly on South Africa and other emerging markets.
Involvement will not be limited to investment but will also cover business developments such as local and international marketing.
Head of the local arm, Andrea Böhmert, says: “In the past SA technology companies found it almost impossible to get funding from international groups.”
He adds: “We will be able to ‘open doors’ across the IT industry, as well as in industrial solutions – from heavy engineering to automotive to green technology.”
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