{"id":583766,"date":"2025-02-24T16:01:08","date_gmt":"2025-02-24T14:01:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=583766"},"modified":"2025-02-24T16:01:14","modified_gmt":"2025-02-24T14:01:14","slug":"the-south-african-who-built-and-sold-a-globally-renowned-tech-company","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/business\/583766-the-south-african-who-built-and-sold-a-globally-renowned-tech-company.html","title":{"rendered":"The South African who built and sold a globally renowned tech company"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

South African-born Steve Raucher founded and built emergency response technology firm RapidDeploy from a local startup to a globally recognised leader in the space. It has now been sold to network infrastructure giant Motorola Solutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

RapidDeploy described the deal as a landmark transaction and one of the largest tech exits in South Africa’s history. The good news is that a large portion of its technical team will continue operating from the company’s base in Cape Town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We are thrilled to announce that RapidDeploy \u2014 a HAVAIC Fund 2 and Fund 3 portfolio company \u2014 has been acquired by Motorola Solutions in a landmark transaction,” it said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“In partnership with founder and CEO Steve Raucher, we have been privileged to support the company’s incredible growth journey from a South African startup to a globally recognised leader in emergency response technology.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Formerly a financial trader, Raucher has over two decades of experience in finance, where he worked on financial trading floors in London and New York City. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This included two associate director positions at UBS, with the first being in London, England, from October 1995 to August 1997, and the second role between January 1998 and February 1999 being Connecticut-based.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Raucher then worked in Index Arbitrage and Program Trading at Credit Suisse in London, England, from April 1999 until October 2000.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At this stage, Raucher took a nearly two-year sabbatical to ride a motorcycle from London to Australia, a journey on which he said he learned a lot about humanity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Speaking to Authority Magazine<\/a> in 2020, Raucher explained that most of the journey was through poor Asian countries, where he spent most nights in a different city, under a stranger’s roof after being fed by them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, he said this kindness disappeared as he returned to the Western world.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“I learned that the less people have, the more they give. We need to remember that and let that ground us. Otherwise, we will be swept up in our first-world lives and risk losing our humanity,” Raucher said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Tragedy strikes and a “reset” needed<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

After his sabbatical, Raucher worked in finance for a few years, holding positions in emerging market equity derivatives at Greenwich Europe from 2002 to 2006 and a lead role in ICAP’s Russian equity derivative business from 2006 until 2010.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tragedy struck Raucher’s family in 2006. His brother Robert ran into difficulty while swimming in the sea outside Cape Town, and despite efforts to mount a rescue, he wasn’t found in time and drowned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Age 31 at the time of his brother’s passing, Steve Raucher lived with the tragedy for years before deciding, in 2015, that he and his family needed a reset while living in London.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The family had a vacation home in Cape Town and retreated there.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was there where Raucher trained to become a Sea Rescue First Responder with the same organisation that had tried to rescue his brother.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“Inspired by the first responders that I worked with, I knew from that point on that I wanted to help those that serve on the front lines,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After volunteering full-time for a year, Raucher realised he needed another job.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Enter volunteer paramedic Brett Meyerowitz, who had been working on an emergency dispatch system he called RapidDeploy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Meyerowitz demonstrated the software for Raucher, tracking an emergency vehicle as it drove through the neighbourhood and passed Ruacher’s window.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Not even a week later, Raucher had acquired half of RapidDeploy, marking his partnership with Meyerowitz.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although the pair only intended RapidDeploy for South African deployment, the goalposts shifted when Raucher met Brian Fontes, CEO of the National Emergency Number Association, at a European conference in 2017.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By March 2019, California had procured RapidDeploy statewide, and the firm had established a base in Austin, Texas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of September 2024, the company employed 110 people and had raised $90 million (R1.6 billion) in venture capital funds. RapidDeploy is found in over 1,700 emergency communication centres in 23 US states.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“If that was available in 2006 in Cape Town, South Africa, we’d be having a different conversation,” said<\/a> Raucher. “But I think we’re going to change a lot of lives, a lot of outcomes.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\n
\"\"\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/svg>\n\t\t<\/button>
Raucher and Meyerowitz at their Cape Town offices<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/svg>\n\t\t<\/button>
Steve Raucher (left); Brett Meyerowitz (right)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/svg>\n\t\t<\/button>
Steve Raucher (middle) holding the original 911 Telephone from Haleyville, Alabama<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A tragedy in the family marked Steve Raucher’s shift from finance to helping build world-renowned tech firm RapidDeploy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341076,"featured_media":583769,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[98917,98918,98916,98915],"class_list":["post-583766","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-brett-meyerowitz","tag-motorola-solutions","tag-rapiddeploy","tag-steve-raucher"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583766"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341076"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=583766"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583766\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":583806,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/583766\/revisions\/583806"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/583769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=583766"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=583766"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=583766"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}