This section houses interviews conducted by Biznews, both video and audio, and other interesting inputs sourced from Third Parties.
South African leaders are always talking about the importance of promoting entrepreneurship, and dozens of programmes seek to give would-be entrepreneurs the skills they need to start businesses. Yet despite this, South Africa has a very low rate of entrepreneurship. As GIBS’ Jonathan Marks tells us below, even among those who choose to do an … Read more
When Tharisa Minerals announced its listing on the JSE, the question that immediately sprang to most minds was: why on earth would anyone list a platinum company on the JSE in April 2014? It’s not exactly a fantastic environment for the sector right now, with crippling strikes and horrible labour relations making the platinum industry’s … Read more
Many, many South African companies have tried to make a go of things in Australia, and very, very few have succeeded. Despite their best efforts, Australia has simply proved to be a tough nut to crack. Yet Woolworths has decided to take a giant gamble on the country, purchasing luxury retailer David Jones. It’s an … Read more
It’s time for South African investors to make some tough decisions. The JSE has enjoyed a very strong run, but as rates rise and the US Fed begins to cut back its quantitative easing, emerging markets like SA are going to come under huge pressure, which will ultimately translate into weaker corporate earnings and thus, … Read more
Investment companies like Brimstone, companies that don’t make or sell anything but exist only to hold stakes in other companies, are an interesting breed. They can be tricky to value – they may be worth more or less than the sum of their parts, depending on what you think of their particular assets and management … Read more
With the news that Nigeria is officially Africa’s largest economy, South Africans are taking a renewed interest in their neighbours to the north. For a long time, South Africans had a sense of superiority – we thought we were doing a better job than our African peers, and that there was nothing to learn from … Read more
With the JSE and S&P 500 at record high levels, and markets around the world having enjoyed a strong run, looking for value can be quite a challenge for investors. With stock prices so high, it’s hard to find companies that will outperform over time, delivering earnings in excess of what their price promises. Nevertheless, … Read more
The Blue Label deal with Retail Mobile Credit Specialists is interesting on many levels, but for me, the most interesting aspect of the deal is CEO Brett Levy’s excitement about the access to a huge database of information about Edcon customers that the deal gives Blue Label. Data is the most important resource in the … Read more
Why would anyone want to be the CEO of Eskom? This is the question that Johan Redelinghuys poses in this interview about succession planning at Eskom, and it’s quite tricky to think of a good answer. After all, why would anyone want to be CEO of Eskom? The entire country is being paralysed by repeated … Read more
I love a positive business story – a story where not only do investors make money, but the company they’re investing also does something worthwhile. So I love this story of a company called International Housing Solutions, which is building thousands of units of low-cost housing targeted at South Africans who earn too much for … Read more