Case Studies

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Cape Chamber of Commerce announces Exporter of the Year finalists

The judges in the annual ABSA/Cape Chamber of Commerce Exporter of the year competition have selected nine finalists who will fight it out for the honours in the 21st year of the competition.

E-Tourism Africa Summit - Social media now playing a bigger role in tourism

The fourth annual E-Tourism Africa Summit, sponsored by South Africa Tourism and Cape Town Tourism, was a resounding success. About 300 people attended the summit at Cape Town International Convention Centre on September 15 and 16, where a significant online buzz was created, with more than 20 pages of tweets and the summit becoming a trending topic for South Africa on Twitter.

The Fringe: Facilitating the growth of the design economy

Cape Town’s creative industry is consolidating in the city and it’s crucially important to strengthen it, say city and provincial interest groups.

Located in a key area of the central city, connected to education centres, transport facilities and criss-crossed by a network of fibre cables, an area called The Fringe was demarcated with the primary aim of stimulating economic growth and creating jobs.

The Cape Town Partnership's Central City Partners Forum met on Wednesday to discuss the project and to update stakeholders on the thinking around the area.

Portside to take Cape Town to new heights

Cape Town's tallest building is to stand at 32 floors and hold 52 000m2 of office space for 3 000 people. R1.6-billion will go into its construction.

At the corner of Bree, Mechau, and Buitengracht Street, the Portside groundbreaking was recently celebrated by the Provincial Government of the Western Cape, First National Bank and Old Mutual Properties.

CTICC supports the World Chef Tour for hunger

The Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC) will be sponsoring the venue for the Cape Town leg of the 2011 Bidvest World Chefs Tour Against Hunger, which is taking place from the 24 - 26 August 2011.

More than 260 chefs from over 45 countries have flown down to South Africa at their own expense for this event, which is hailed as the global culinary fraternity's biggest ever fundraising initiative. The aim is to raise R5 million to feed children in selected charities for five years.

South Africa improves competitiveness

South Africa improved its ranking in the World Economic Forum's (WEF's) latest Global Competitiveness Index, climbing four places to 50th out of 142 countries surveyed, while claiming top spot for regulation of exchanges and second place for soundness of banks.

Published on Wednesday, the annual Global Competitiveness Report was first released in 1979 and has since evolved into the prime authority on relative competitiveness among most of the world's nations.

Respondent numbers have grown over the years, with the 2011-12 report covering 142 countries and some 14 000 respondents.

Innovation celebrated at Accelerate Cape Town AGM

Annual General Meetings can sometimes be seen as boring, with standard reports on a year’s activities, and dry-as-dust procedural formalities. Accelerate Cape Town’s AGM in August, however, departed from this format with a celebration of innovation that included inspiring words from the Mayor of Cape Town, the latest in food development, and even test drives in South Africa’s first electric car.
In the spirit of Accelerate Cape Town’s ‘Vision 2030’ for Cape Town, as a global African city – a city of inspiration and innovation – the AGM focused on celebrating innovation in the Cape Town Region.
The event, which marked Accelerate Cape Town’s fifth year of existence, was held at The 7th Floor Food Innovation Centre at Black River Parkway.

Amazon opens new call centre in Cape Town

Amazon has opened a new customer service and development centre in Cape Town. The centre will support its customers in North America, the UK and Germany. Amazon's Cape Town facility currently employs just under 500 people and anticipates 1 400 people in permanent positions by the end of 2012.

Successful business breakfasts unite Cape businesses and international visitors

In the lead-in to the FIFA 2010 World Cup, Cape business recognised that most visiting football fans, many having significant business interests in their home countries, would choose to spend at least some of their time in Cape Town. The opportunity to connect these visitors with local businesses could not be overlooked – and so the Cape business community, together with the City of Cape Town and the Western Cape Provincial Government, compiled an innovative programme of business breakfasts with compelling speakers and unique networking opportunities.

Quickstart Global creates jobs, utilising Capetonian skill sets.

Quickstart Global opened their sixth delivery center in Cape Town, South Africa in March 2009. The new location, which complements Quickstart Global's existing delivery centres across four continents, marks the latest phase in their continuous expansion. The first three client centres opened by Quickstart Global are based in Pune and Vadodara (India) and Sofia in Bulgaria. Since the establishment of the client centres, over 300 jobs have been created in Vadodara, almost 200 in Pune and over 100 in Sofia. The impact on the local economy has been significant, as the creation of well paid, stable, professional jobs filters through to the surrounding areas. Since opening in March, Quickstart Global has brought several UK based clients to the Cape Town office and now has staff in IT development, testing and analyst roles.

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