New Business

South Africa's high rate of unemployment, poverty and extreme inequality call for bold and far- sighted interventions, Small Business Development Minister Lindiwe Zulu told the Global Entrepreneurship Congress in Milan, Italy, last week.

A R9.65-billion private-public investment at Saldanha Bay, on South Africa's West Coast, aims at improve the deep-water port's ability to service to offshort oil and gas industry, the Transnet National Ports Authority announced on Monday.

Following Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies' visit to Hollywood last week, the government will be leading a delegation of South African film makers to Los Angeles to engage with the major studios, the minister announced on Tuesday.

Teams of representatives from the government, business, labour, civil society and academia have begun working on plans to unlock the economic potential of South Africa's oceans, in the first activation of a new initiative, dubbed Operation Phakisa, that was launched by President Jacob Zuma on the weekend.

South African commuters using the country's most popular form of public transport - the minibus taxi - will now be able to update their Facebook status, check their e-mail and surf the internet through a free wi-fi connection on their way to work.

Mobile broadband is the primary way sub-Saharan Africa consumers access the internet, Swedish company Ericsson points out in its latest report on mobility in Sub-Saharan Africa. It predicts that there will be 930-million subscriptions in the region in just five years time.

South African government support programmes for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) are receiving better approval ratings from their users, according to a new survey by technology market researchers World Wide Worx.

South African comedian David Kau clinched a deal with US company Archstone Distribution the Cannes Film Festival on Tuesday for his upcoming movie Sekwankwetla, about a South African township superhero who can fly - but no more than 10 centimetres high.

South Africa's Johannesburg Stock Exchange - one of the top 20 exchanges in the world in terms of market capitalisation - has teamed up with Google Finance to enable local and international and investors to track JSE equity market data online.

Trade and Industry Minister Rob Davies officially launched the Durban branch of the South African Chemical Technology Incubator at the University of KwaZulu-Natal last week. The centre offers free support services to small chemical technology businesses in the province.