Western Cape Business 2018 edition

SPECIAL FEATURE
Elsewhere in the province, boreholes are being dug but
longer-term plans will have to worked out to deal with
the problem. One idea being mooted in Cape Town
is the creation of suburban underground reservoirs to
collect stormwater from run-off.
Tourism is a sector where the Western Cape has
been strong for many years, but the current levels are
providing a material boost to the economy in many
parts of the province. Each region has its strengths
and there is terrific diversity on offer.
A new area of strength in the Western Cape is technology.
France has officially designated the city as one
of six global French Tech Hubs, together with the likes
of San Francisco, Tel Aviv and New York. French Tech
Labs was launched as a fintech incubator at Century
City in 2016 and the British bank, Barclays Bank, has
also invested in a fintech incubator in Cape Town, Rise.
There are six other Rise sites around the world, including
New York, Vilnius and Mumbai.
The presence of French and British firms points to an
interesting new reality which will soon come into force,
namely Britain’s exit from the European Union. South
Africa will need to renegotiate treaties with Britain as a
free-standing nation and France has already signalled
that it wants to start doing more business with and
in South Africa. AfricArena 2017, a technology conference
expressly designed to link African technology
innovators with “international technology stalwarts”,
was surely part of that drive, co-hosted as it was by La
French Tech Cape Town and Silicon Cape.
WESTERN CAPE BUSINESS 2018
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