The 26th floor of the head office of Africa's biggest company is known as the "Nasdak" - a clever combination of "Naspers" and the Afrikaans word for roof, pronounced almost exactly like "Nasdaq", the stock exchange in New York known for its tech stocks. At Naspers, this floor is a function venue boasting spectacular views of Table Mountain and Cape Town's harbour. A place where executives might be able to gaze out at the natural attractions and into the future beyond. The name was suggested by one of the hundreds of journalists who worked for SA's largest newspaper publisher in the early 2000s. Whether it was pure coincidence or revealed a deeper ambition, it foreshadowed Naspers's transformation from a print and pay-TV business into a consumer-facing technology giant. The kind of company that could be a big player on the Nasdaq. Winged stallion But this week, when the company shared its plans to hive off a part of its assets, it named not the Nasdaq but Amsterdam's Euronext exchan...
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