Sagarmatha’s castles in the air
Iqbal Survé’s latest undertaking is long on ambition, but short on reasons for savvy investors to part with their money
What a wonderful story it would make: an African Amazon, or an African Tencent or even an African Alibaba. Who of us wouldn’t love that to be possible? Sadly, it’s not. And no amount of wishing or business school cut-and-paste sloganeering will make it so. Being sceptical about turning a collection of loss-making and insolvent media and Internet businesses into "an integrated multisided platform ecosystem in Africa that knits technology platforms, content creation and distribution and e-commerce into a consolidated value proposition aimed at attracting prime customers for monetisation" doesn’t inherently make someone an Afro-pessimist. It’s unlikely, at this stage, that even a well-resourced entity with a proven record in Europe, Russia, Brazil, India or Australia could usurp the dominance of the US Internet giants. Unless, that is, the US government were to decide to break them up in the interests of increased competition and fair elections. China, as in all things, is different. R...
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.
Subscribe now to unlock this article.
Support BusinessLIVE’s award-winning journalism for R129 per month (digital access only).
There’s never been a more important time to support independent journalism in SA. Our subscription packages now offer an ad-free experience for readers.
Cancel anytime.
Questions? Email helpdesk@businesslive.co.za or call 0860 52 52 00. Got a subscription voucher? Redeem it now.