WESTVILLE’S Solam Dontsa and his partner, Mpumelelo Tembe, were part of a group of amazing young innovators who were involved in the Maritime Youth Innovation Challenge.
The challenge, held for the fourth time, was a flagship programme of Durban ideas and strategy incubator, Innovate Durban, with the 2018 challenge having a firm focus on the maritime industry.
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After an inspiring, exciting and gruelling six-month challenge, innovators Smartipants were awarded first place and Solam Dontsa and his partner, Mpumeleo Tembe (Load Box) came second.
Celebrating the innovators, a director on Innovate Durban board, Richard Gevers said, “The maritime industry is the heart of our country’s economy. Understanding that, this journey has been inspiring to see our young innovators understanding and stimulating skills and activities around our busy ports.”
The winning team earned themselves a R50 000 grant from top global IT company, Oracle and Innovate Durban; a six-month Acceleration Programme with Innovate Durban; a three-month internship with Transnet, and internship and support with global engineering and infrastructure advisory company, Aurecon. Law firm Adams & Adams will offer free consultations to all three winners, and for the top winner, they are offering free trade mark applications and free registered design application.
Earning second place, the team, Load Box, won a R35 000 grant through the Domino Foundation and Innovate Durban; a six month Acceleration Programme with Innovate Durban, and a three month internship with Transnet. Their challenge touched on the supply chain integration with Transnet.
Third place was tied between Trailblazer and the Sagiya Foundation.
The two-man team from Trailblazer focused their challenge on skills-development with shore-side staff in the ports optimising modern-day, technology-driven working environments. Sagiya Foundation’s winning challenge was the idea of a port radio station.
They each get a R25 000 grant through Innovate Durban; a three-month internship with Transnet, and six-month Acceleration Programme with Innovate Durban.
Managing Transnet’s innovation portfolio, Willy Coetzee, was blown away by the ideas.
“The quality of thinking and the proposals presented have been impressive throughout the process. The different concepts all communicated by these guys are fresh and exciting and brings about new thinking in the age-old trade of maritime while addressing pressing problems in the port of Durban.”
The themes of the challenges included Infrastructure, Environment, Capacity and Transport and Logistics. The Maritime Youth Innovation Challenge was pre-ambled by a series of workshops to aid the participants to develop solutions to the challenge they had selected.
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