We held the E Squared Portfolio Summit this past weekend (17 September 2022) to recognise and celebrate our portfolio companies for their achievements to date. At our event we encouraged businesses to build collaboration and healthy company culture in their teams for scaling. Notable guest speakers included comedian Jason Goliath, Endeavor MD Alison Collier and serial entrepreneur Nic Haralambous.
We launched our inaugural Responsible Entrepreneurship Awards to recognise each portfolio business for its alignment with our values and desired behaviours. Over the course of the next few days, we will be sharing with you the businesses that embody our values of Long-term commitment, Spirit of humility and significance, Excellence, Responsible Stewardship, Diversity, Collaboration and behaviours of Growth and Traction, Governance and reporting, and Social impact.
Thank you to all our stellar hard-working smart-thinking responsible entrepreneurs that attended the event – we learned a lot, got to meet the dynamic partners behind the founding teams and had a lot of fun!
Fast vs. Far: Competition makes us fast – collaboration takes us further
Drumroll for the overall winner…
Responsible Entrepreneurship Award
They were awarded for being a business that has both embodied the values and put into practice the behaviours that we, at E Squared, believe represent Responsible Entrepreneurship.
The young and dynamic founding team, comprised of @Lungelo Linda Gumede, @Ludwick Marishane, and @Lesedi Makena, are driven by a common passion for long-term contribution and who work collaboratively to leverage their complementary skills and approaches to maintain a culture of excellence and to support responsible decision-making aimed at achieving a shared growth and impact vision.
Edtech start-up @Excel@Uni empowers tertiary students by increasing their odds of graduating on time, training them to be work-ready, and helping them earn an income while studying.
The business has developed operational and financial systems and processes that support its impressive growth and traction. Their year-to-date revenues for 2022 are significantly higher than for the same period last year and the business has driven customer service excellence and a positive impact on the lives of their growing list of users.
OUR VALUES
The awards for Long-term Commitment
Nafasi
This business has demonstrated:
· Long-term commitment to:
ensuring availability and sustainable management of a scarce resource
pan-African impact
clear long-term KPIs
Technical & innovation excellence
Cape Bio
This business has demonstrated:
Strong industry relationship-building
The ability to build a strong management team and Board
Sustained but flexible focus on Long Term vision
Ongoing product development, research and innovation
The awards for Spirit of Humility and Significance
Xplorio
This business has demonstrated:
Innovation around community impact and engagement
Innovative impact-focused user retention and support strategy during the COVID-19 pandemic
Strong vision and mission drive
Humility and integrity
Nambu
This business has demonstrated:
Strong resilience in face of COVID-related constraints
Strong commitment to ecosystem capacitation training and development
Strong passion for the impact purpose of the business
Strong culture of service and contribution
The award for the value of Excellence
Media Measure
This business has demonstrated:
Constant systems innovation around innovation and efficiency-enhancement
Focus on ongoing customer-focused product development
Tireless commitment to high-value over-delivery and value creation for customers
Commitment to ongoing learning and improvement
The award for Responsible Stewardship
OFIN
This business has demonstrated:
Commitment to responsible management of Fellowship resources
Self-sacrifice and cautious cost-containment and management
Commitment to contribution to Fellowship
Openness and honest engagement
The award for Diversity and Inclusion
Oh My Cake!
This business has demonstrated:
Commitment to team culture and development of staff
Commitment to female employment and earning opportunity-creation
Mutual respect between founding and operational team
Digital Africa Ventures (DAV)
This business has demonstrated:
Strong management team cohesion and collaboration
Commitment to constructive post-investment partnerships with investees
Focus on, and passion for, investment in black-owned businesses, and for pan-African growth
The awards for Collaboration
Xplorio
This business has demonstrated:
Strong, collaborative founding team with supportive and complementary skills
Strong spirit and practice of collaboration with customer and user community members
Strong culture of dialogue and community engagement
Media Measure
This business has demonstrated:
Strong collaboration-driven approach with customers and clients
Strong company culture, with an intentional focus on team development and leadership from within
Strong, mutually beneficial partnership of trust with service provider/s
RECOGNITION OF BEHAVIOURS
The award for growth and traction
Khula!
This business has had a:
Positive EV Growth since E Squared Investment and
Sustained growth in diverse revenue streams
The award for Governance and Reporting
Excel@Uni
The business has implemented and maintained:
A state-of-the-art custom sales pipeline tracking tool
Timely, accurate monthly reporting to E Squared, feeding from internal reporting processes and systems
A strong understanding of its KPIs and performance and sustainability drivers
The awards for Social Impact
Khula
The business has driven impact through:
Providing a simple-to-navigate, easy-to-use app-based tool to equalise access to ecosystem customers and suppliers for producers nationally
On-boarding 200+ suppliers selling 5000+ products, enabling users across the business stage, LSM groups and locations to gain guaranteed access to inputs at fair, standard prices
Providing access to formal demand market for informal industry players
Rewoven
The business has driven impact through:
Industry lobbying for regulatory change and sub-sector recognition
Stimulating and promoting the circular economy
Diversion of waste from landfill
Bringing together diverse players along the sector value chain to drive integrated value-adding solutions and products
A hearty congratulations to all these amazing entrepreneurs. We are privileged to be able to journey with you!
Our Allan Gray Fellow portfolio companies include: Nafasi Water, Xplorio CapeBio Technologies, Nambu, Media Measure, Ofin, OhMyCake, Digital Africa Ventures (DAV), Khula!, Excel@uni and Rewoven.
