It was late 1998, and I was at a cross-roads in my life. I was working as a Financial Analyst for a large international corporate, and they offered me the opportunity of a lifetime - the chance to become a Chartered Accountant by doing my articles with them, and then to work for them for a couple years once I had qualified. It was a 5 year plan mapped out.

That night I went out with my cousin to the Nando’s in Gresswold (don’t know if that one still exists) and we spoke till 3 in the morning…

But not about my corporate opportunity. [Read more →]

7th October 2009
For immediate release

Cape Town based Internet Startup, Fashion Evolution Holdings, has
raised a further R4M ($0.5M) in its second round of funding, with the
aim of commercialising its social network, crowdsourcing, & eCommerce
web based software platform, to be used to launch further internal
brands, as well as being used for powering 3rd party websites.

Fashion Evolution’s first brand, springleap.com, launched 18 months
ago, and has become the largest crowdsourcing website in South
Africa, as well as one of the most popular T-shirt crowdsourcing
websites internationally.

Eran Eyal, Fashion Evolution co-founder stated that “we’ve completed
stage 1 of our business model, which was the launch of
springleap.com, and the R4M will allow us to take our vision to the
next level, as we focus on further developing & improving all
components of our web platform, in addition to expanding the product
range from T-shirts to multiple products.”

Eric Edelstein, CEO & co-founder added: “Imagine a large company such
as a beer company, creating a new name for a beer. Using our web
based platform, in a matter of weeks, not only can they have a fully
functioning 100% branded crowdsourcing, social network website
centered around their offering, but using our unique methodology,
they can also have a community of people wanting to get involved. The
creative side of the community will conceptualise new names, and the
general community will interact with the brand on multiple levels
such as voting on the various names, and commenting & discussing
ideas around the brand.”

Fashion Evolution’s startup capital was contributed by the founders,
and a short while later YDE founder Paul Simon, took a shareholding
to take the company to the next level. Now Lord Duncan Barratt has
invested in the company, resulting in accelerated growth to the next
stage of its plan.

Lord Barratt remarked, “The business model shows incredible potential
to quickly become another success story along the lines of Facebook,
Twitter and Ning, and the founders and current management team are
adding astounding amounts of passion, dedication & knowledge to
ensure the success of the venture.”

Enquiries:
Eran Eyal
082 717 3802
eran@springleap.com

Tonight I was PRIVILEGED to listen, be inspired, motivated, learn and meet Dr Carnie Matheson. I have an oberservation & favour to ask of Dr Matheson:

The Favour: I don’t want you to fly down to Cape Town to mentor me! Rather, whenever it suits you, I’d like to fly up to JHB, and take you to your favourite restaurant. I’d be honoured if you would mentor me!

The Observation: You don’t have an online identity! I’ve done countless searches in google, linkedin and facebook for recognition of your name and accolades. If this is on purpose, you’ve done an amazing job. If not, my return favour for being mentored is to create your internet identity.

Dr Carnie Matheson started his adult life living in a Pantry, and then became a Financial Analyst with Nedbank over 35 years ago, and now describes himself as a GRAVE DANCER:

I take dying business’s and Resurrect them!

For 2 hours, Dr Carnie Matheson, kept us enthralled with real life stories relating to being a successful entrepreneur.

These are the GEMS I picked up:

[Read more →]

We are extremely privileged to have a team of full time MBA students from the Cape Town Graduate School of Business that have chosen springleap to analyse as their company analysis project.

Speaking to these dynamic & motivated individuals, together with having finished the 3rd chapter of Frank Furness’s EXCELLENT book on becoming a business tiger, got me thinking about growing springleap even faster than it is. It also has got me strategising about our long term business model.

So this morning, we spent an interesting 2 hours being partially grilled by a company that assists companies to raise their venture capital funding.

[Read more →]

The weather was perfect today in Cape Town! So around midday, we met some friends at clifton 4th beach. And then we stood around for a couple of hours talking about how lucky we are to live, in what we all think is the most INCREDIBLE city in the world - and clifton 4th beach is probably the best beach in the world!

Now the problem in summer, is that although clifton 4th beach is the place, everyone else also thinks so, and so parking is HORRENDOUS. It takes ages to get parking.

But on this perfect winter day today, there was parking RIGHT next to the steps leading down to the beach.

There were a lot of foreign accents on the beach, and while listening to a host of dialects, it reminded me of a book I was browsing through at my friends birthday last night (HAPPY BIRTHDAY LEONIE!!!) - it’s called something along the lines of “The hidden secret Cape Town” and is all about finding places in Cape Town off the beaten track - stuff that even the regulars don’t know about.

The one that intrigued me was for a tour down the undercity waterways - apparently they were built from 1652 onwards when Jan van Riebeck arrived in the Cape. The website listed in the book was 180.co.za, but I took a look at the site, and i’m not sure if that is the correct URL (that book was written a few years back). But it sounds like a FASCINATING tour, and there are a group of us already keen to do it. (and it’s led by a Camel Adventure participant!)

The other thing that fascinated me on clifton 4th beach was the number of construction sites you can see from the beach using cranes. I counted SIX cranes! If anyone can direct me to a site that explains how cranes are set up and taken down, I’d love to check it out, as I’ve had quite a few convo’s already about how they get those cranes setup, and how they don’t fall over!

Why can’t EVERYDAY be a perfect summery day in winter! Next time it’s a summer day in Winter, do yourself a favour, and get to clifton 4th beach (or one of the other amazing beaches in Cape Town) ASAP!