🌻 Saving Airbnb Owners R5 Million Per Day
Competitive SA access? If you’re keen to try Google DeepMind’s new Veo 3 AI video creator, you know, so you can create vids like this, you might not have to fork over $250 (R4’500 per month). With the Flow tool and Google One, South Africans can get 1’000 credits for just R430 pm. Nice.
In this Open Letter:
- Smart move: New solar intelligence can save hotels/Airbnbs R5M a day.
- SA’s zero carbon charging, free Samsung SOS+ & PnP’s new-look asap!
- The fastest tools to explore ideas, build apps & market them on LinkedIn.
- Know who delivers clean drinking water to schools? The results are in.
- Lonely building your startup? Join The Open Collab and get support.
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TRENDING NOW
Saving SA Hotels and Airbnbs R5 Million Per Day
In this Tuesday deep dive, we explore the effects of SA’s business energy tariffs on hotels and Airbnbs before introducing you to the startup that’s slashing those by 50% out of the gate…
It’s been 11 days (and counting) since we last had loadshedding. And so far, 2025’s been a good year with only 8 days of loadshedding, compared to 2023’s 284 days.
No wonder, then, that now in winter, many SA businesses that invested in the R17.5 billion solar boom of 2023 are shifting focus from energy independence to energy intelligence: maximising the financial return of every kilowatt.
Why? Well, when there’s less sunshine, heavy-use businesses like hotels often need to dip back into Eskom grid usage, which gets pricey…
While inflation hit 129% from 2007 to 2022, Eskom’s tariffs increased 5x the rate of inflation: a staggering 653%, not including 18% and 13% increases in ‘23 and ‘24, the nearly 13% increase of April ‘25 and more increases coming in ‘26 and ‘27 – leaving South Africa with the world’s 54th most expensive electricity.
And it becomes particularly important when you consider that businesses get charged way more per kilowatt than the average person:
The devastating business cost of keeping the lights on
Both Eskom and municipalities use Time-of-Use (TOU) tariffs, which charge businesses:
- More during peak periods (mornings and evenings).
- Less during off-peak (late at night or early morning hours)
- Standard prices for transitional periods between the two.
Now, imagine you’re a hotel, lodge, residence or Airbnb, etc., where your customers pay for your facilities and insist on getting their money’s worth. Studies show that tourists’ water and energy usage often doubles or triples when they stay in a paid room, and you can bet that’s during peak time, putting strain on the grid and your pocket.
Hotels in SA can run up staggering utility bills per month (with 140k hotels and Airbnbs, an average usage of 15kWh per room, costing R36 each, that’s an estimate of R5 million in energy costs per day), eating into the bottom line and putting the ROI from their fancy solar system in jeopardy.
Good thing we found an SA startup that’s using smart tools and AI to drop any hotel’s energy usage by 50% (for some, they’ve even managed to completely offset, as in 100% cost reduction, with a little clever use of tech)...
The local startup maximising the financial return of every kilowatt
Soluno is a South African startup helping businesses turn their solar investments into serious savings. They give businesses with existing solar setups of 100kW or more (big ones, with a hefty price tag) a smart software platform that manages how energy is stored, used and even sold back to the grid.
Instead of letting those batteries sit idle as backup waiting for the next round of loadshedding, Soluno makes them an active part of your savings game: The system charges batteries when electricity is cheapest (usually during off-peak hours late at night) and then draws from those batteries during peak periods, when power is most expensive, to ensure your get the lowest price and max ROI on your energy.
And if conditions are right, Soluno can even help clients feed excess energy back into the grid during peak times, earning them credits at a higher rate than they pay for what they draw at night.
Now remember, companies with massive solar installations can also run off pure solar during the day, and Soluno will automatically and continuously manage the flow of energy usage versus solar power, stored battery power, grid power and feeding excess power back, so you always get max benefit.
How much benefit? Soluno confidently guarantees savings for hotels and heavy-use industries, with some clients seeing reductions of up to 50%, and in some cases, even full offset. As the platform learns your usage patterns over time, it continually adapts to maximise financial returns.
“Free” power? Why not? While Eskom’s stable, for now, the price pressure’s still there, so solutions like Soluno helping businesses gain more real energy ROI mean we’re watching this space….
CHECK THIS OUT
Go Global with Your IP
A practical roadmap for high-growth companies
Startups and high-growth South African companies face a major hurdle: Exchange Controls restrict their ability to move Intellectual Property (IP) offshore, limiting access to global investment.
The IP Strategy Flow, however, offers a clear and practical framework to overcome this by enabling companies to create and own their IP in an offshore structure, building hard currency value and positioning for international funding and exit:
1. Invention Culture
It starts at the top. Founders and boards make a documented commitment to innovation. This early decision empowers the company to develop new ideas offshore and lays the groundwork for legally establishing IP outside of South Africa.
2. Blue Sky Structure
A Blue Sky team explores new product ideas through structured sessions held offshore. At least one person, employed by the offshore company, must attend and record detailed notes on ideas and proposals. These records are key to showing that the IP originated offshore.
3. Board Process
The team refines concepts into formal proposals outlining commercial potential, development needs and strategy. And the board authorises budgets and accountability structures, creating a documented trail of offshore decision-making and ownership.
4. Development Starts
With board approval, a product manager leads execution. Contracts, timelines and deliverables are clearly defined to ensure the IP remains securely offshore in both structure and practice.
5. Commercialisation
OffshoreCo begins generating revenue. A sales manager formalises contracts, invoices clients and retains profits offshore, further cementing offshore ownership.
6. Enhancement & Maintenance
Product improvements based on user input. Maintenance and support are built into offshore operations and contracts, keeping all enhancements aligned with the IP Strategy.
Get some more insights here:
Exchange controls no longer need to define your company’s ceiling. With this kind of IP Strategy Flow, you can access international markets, attract capital and grow value offshore, in hard currency.
It’s more than strategy, it’s your roadmap to global relevance.
Explore the IP Strategy Flow in detail →
IN SHORT
Grab a few of these to keep the convo flowing…
🔌 Charge it up. The Development Bank of Southern Africa has dropped a cool R100 million equity investment into Zero Carbon Charge to accelerate SA’s shift towards a net-zero transport economy, and power CHARGE’s mission to install ultra-fast EV charging stations every 150 km along national roads. Very interesting stuff.
🚨 Don't panic. Samsung SA recently launched Samsung SOS+ through its partnership with local emergency-response-on-demand platform AURA. This free-to-use, 24/7 emergency response subscription is exclusive to the new Galaxy A56, A36 and A26 devices, and valid for 12 months. Incredible accomplishment by the AURA team.
🛵 (Online) store revamp. Pick n Pay is bringing some major updates to its online grocery delivery platform, asap!, as well as a revamp of the Pick n Pay website coming 1 June. These enhancements come off the back of a 48.7% growth in online sales in the year leading up to 2 March 2025. Online grocery space is hotting up.
🪙 Smooth crypto moves. According to a recent Pretoria High Court case brought by Standard Bank against the South African Reserve Bank (SARB), Cryptocurrencies are not subject to SA exchange control regulations since they do not constitute “capital” or “currency”. But don’t pop the champagne just yet, as legal experts are betting SARB will amend its regulations to include cryptocurrencies and close the loophole.
💰 Got Spaza Cash. MTN is entering the payments market by offering MoMo pay. It allows merchants to accept instant payments via QR code, merchant ID or payment request, at a minimal fee of just 0.5%.
😎 The Stack. Founders need tools and suppliers they can trust. Check out our Founder’s Stack with easy-peasy business valuations with bizval, hardware, software, acceleration and funding for remarkable builds with Octoco and loads more vital startup tools & services.
FOUNDER’S CORNER
3 Tips for Business Builders
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Get the latest trending business ideas. Even a free account with Ideabrowser gives you insane info on revenue potential, proof and signals, market cap, GTM and more on one random trending idea per day. Paid options give you full access to all ideas and even custom reports.
Turn your idea into a website or MVP. We’ve all heard about vibe coding, and Macaly lets you take any idea and use prompts only to generate a full website or even app in a few minutes.
Run a full marketing campaign on LinkedIn. Once your site or MVP app is up, Taplio’s AI was trained on over 500M LinkedIn posts, so it’s a great place to go and create weeks’ worth of great content and ads in just a few minutes.
BUILDING TOGETHER
Happening over at The Open Collab
29 May 12:000 — Dos and Don’ts of Early-Stage Startup Fundraising: Get a breakdown of real fundraising scenarios with convertibles, SAFEs, equity and clauses that make or break your venture future with Jaques Stemmet from venture legal specialists, Dommisse Attorneys — reserve your seat for free.
30 May 12:000 — Power of Storytelling Masterclass: Marketing, driving sales and attracting investment all boils down to your ability to craft and share stories — Jo Eyre from Voxeon gives SA startups the inside track.
13 June 12:00 — The Art of Strategy Masterclass: How high-growth founders think & win: Cut through complexity and create a scalable strategy for profitable growth with Jason Goldberg, Art of Scale author and co-founder of Edge Growth.
Thinking about joining The Open Collab?
- Supercharge your network in the SA startup landscape — get that introduction, get that customer, or meet that partner.
- Get feedback on your products, services and/or offers from others who have built and are building their own products right now.
- Join all our online and in-person events for free!
- Exclusive 1-on-1 sessions with startup consultants.
SA’s only dedicated tech startup and scale-up founder network.
WHAT YOU SAID
Keep ‘em hydrated…
Last Friday, we riddled you on a SA startup with a unique solution to purify water in rural areas, and most recognised Kusini Water…
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩 💧 Kusini Water (66%)
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🌰 NutriDrop (17%)
⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 🚰 ClearSpring SA (0)
🟨⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️⬜️ 💦 AquaKind (17%)
Your 2 cents…
Whoops, slight unfair advantage, but we’ll take it, Charmaine. 🎯
HOW DID WE DO?
BEFORE YOU GO
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Until next time,
Elvorne, Renier & Jason
