In this episode, we're thrilled to sit down with Calvin Collett, Founder and CEO of Melon Mobile - Africa’s first truly digital telco, offering consumers a fully customisable mobile network experience.

Founded in 2022, Melon is disrupting a sector that's long been controlled by a handful of industry incumbents, by combining digital eSim technology, a slick app-first proposition, hyper-customisation and unprecedented pricing - to create an exciting "do-it-yourself" mobile network experience. Coupled with their recently-launched (and highly popular) national billboard campaign, they're fast becoming a hit with consumers and SMEs across the country.

With more than 2 decades of telco experience behind him, a world-class team alongside, and armed with a truly innovative proposition, Melon Mobile are pioneering the next generation of telecoms disruption.

We talk about:

• Calvin's upbringing and early career.
• What makes a great entrepreneur.
• Moving from corporate executive, to intrapreneur, to founder.
• Raising capital and the right team.
• Finding competitive edge in a crowded sector.
• What's next for Calvin and Melon Mobile.

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Connect with Calvin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/calvin-collett/
Connect with Mathew: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mathewmarsden/

This episode was brought to you in partnership with Injini - Africa's only EdTech specialised accelerator, established on the belief that innovation and technology can help solve the continent’s most pressing education challenges. Injini supports edtech founders through a bespoke acceleration program, they lead education research and advisory support through their ThinkTank and host the country’s annual Edtech week. Visit injini.africa to learn more.

The Startup Club Podcast dives into the stories of South Africa's leading tech startup founders and investors, their journeys of innovation, failure, resilience, and triumph and is an initiative of Startup Club ZA - the country’s fastest-growing tech startup and investor community. If you're passionate about entrepreneurship, innovation, solving hard problems, backing the change-makers and co-creating a better country, then you're invited to join us! 🇿🇦

Connect with us:

Website - https://www.startupclubza.com
LinkedIn - https://za.linkedin.com/company/startup-club-za
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/startupclub.za/

In this episode, we're excited to sit down with Lynton Peters, Founder and exited-CEO of OneCart - South Africa's premier online, on-demand delivery service - that lets customers shop across multiple stores, in a single order, with one delivery fee, arriving at their in under 60minutes.

In 2023, South Africa’s e-commerce market generated an estimated R71bn in revenue, largely driven by sectors like clothing/apparel, entertainment/hobbies and electronics. Alongside growing demand for conventional goods and services, has been the exponential growth in South Africa’s online grocery space - and in particular - the surge in on-demand and last-mile delivery services available. In fact, it’s now common practice for many consumers to buy their groceries online and have them delivered direct to their doorstep.

Founded in 2016, OneCart is one of South Africa's on-demand grocery delivery pioneers and has played a key role in establishing the category. Within 5 years, the business grew to over 1000 direct/indirect employees and achieved triple-digit revenue growth annually - largely accelerated by the Covid19 lockdowns - before being sold to Massmart (Wallmart’s African subsidiary) in late-2021, in one of the country's largest-ever e-commerce acquisitions.

Since leaving the business in 2022, Lynton has become an active angel investor and remains motivated to build Africa, armed with the insights and experience that come with being one of South Africa’s few exited tech founders.

We talk about:

• Lynton's upbringing, early-career and returning to South African roots.
• Transitioning from corporate leader to startup pioneer.
• Building product, welcoming co-founders and raising capital.
• The companies acquisition to Massmart and his life after exit.
• What's next for Lynton.

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Connect with Lynton: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lyntonp/
Connect with Mathew: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mathewmarsden/

This episode was brought to you in partnership with Paystack - helping businesses in Africa get paid by anyone, anywhere in the world - thanks to their suite of world-class payment solutions, intuitive APIs, founder-centric support and an exciting (and free!) credit program called Paystack Catalyst, purposefully created to help startups accelerate their growth. To learn more visit paystack.com/za.

The Startup Club Podcast dives into the stories of South Africa's leading tech startup founders and investors, their journeys of innovation, failure, resilience, and triumph and is an initiative of Startup Club ZA - the country’s fastest-growing tech startup and investor community. If you're passionate about entrepreneurship, innovation, solving hard problems, backing the change-makers and co-creating a better country, then you're invited to join us! 🇿🇦

Connect with us:

Website - https://www.startupclubza.com
LinkedIn - https://za.linkedin.com/company/startup-club-za
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/startupclub.za/

In this episode, we're thrilled to sit down with Paul Kent, Founder and CEO of adumo, the multi-channel payments platform that's helping businesses get paid, boost their customer engagement and keep employees motivated.

The last two decades have seen a radical transformation in South Africa’s payments landscape, evolving from predominantly cash-heavy commerce to a world that's embracing digital infrastructure. The space is both diverse and dynamic, with a mix of traditional banking systems, mobile payment platforms, challenger POS brands and a growing consumer appetite for fintech solutions.

Having built one of the country’s first non-bank card payments businesses, SureSwipe, Paul Kent has witnessed this payments revolution first-hand. Over a decade later, his experience culminated in the founding of Adumo in 2019, which has since grown to serve more than 23 000 active merchants and process over R100-billion in throughput across channels annually. Earlier this month, Adumo received approval from the country's Competition Commission to be fully acquired by listed financial services group, Lesaka Technologies, in a R1.6bn cash/equity deal. For Paul and the Adumo team though, the opportunity remains greater than ever.

We talk about:

• Paul's upbringing, early career and juggling talent over passion.
• Leaning in when opportunity knocks.
• Lessons from building multiple ventures in a competitive space.
• The founder journey from start to acquisition.
• What's next for Paul and the Adumo team.

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Connect with Paul: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulkentsa/
Connect with Mathew: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mathewmarsden/

This episode was brought to you in partnership with Guardrisk Launchpad - a pioneering initiative that's driving insure-tech innovation through capital and value-added support services to qualifying scaleups. Learn more at the halfway mark of today’s episode - or visit https://grlaunchpad.com.

The Startup Club Podcast dives into the stories of South Africa's leading tech startup founders and investors, their journeys of innovation, failure, resilience, and triumph and is an initiative of Startup Club ZA - the country’s fastest-growing tech startup and investor community. If you're passionate about entrepreneurship, innovation, solving hard problems, backing the change-makers and co-creating a better country, then you're invited to join us! 🇿🇦

Connect with us:

Website - https://www.startupclubza.com
LinkedIn - https://za.linkedin.com/company/startup-club-za
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/startupclub.za/