Tshimologong Innovation Hub celebrated 5 years of making dreams come true this past week. It was only fitting that the night is kickstarted with a word from the man who started it all. Prof Barry Dwolatzky, who is now the Director Innovation and Strategy at Wits.
Prof Barry shared a story of where it all started. His story was one of passion, will and determination. We can now safely say that those three are a combination of success tools. Prof Barry took his passion and went knocking on doors to bring his dream of a digital innovation hub to light. The University of Witswatersrand assisted him with an old building which used to be club. It is quiet interesting that the main stage at the precinct has footprint that symbolize that the space was once a night club
Dance space to a creators space
From a mere night club to a place where many young people continue to innovate and meet their dreams. The precinct invited some of the people who went through their programs and managed to build reputable businesses and innovations. Four brave innovators shared their businesses with the audience, here are two stories that stood out.
Lucia Nunu Shabangu is one of the ladies who were part of the Ya Basadi program. Her events and marketing business, Complit Events took a hit when the lockdown was first announced in March 2020. After going through a rigorous skills and development training session and also learning about programming, she developed Complit Swing. Complit Swing is a golfing game that uses virtual reality, allowing golfers to engage with people from different parts of the world.
Senso is a company founded on ensuring that everyone has a fair chance of escaping danger by creating awareness of danger. The founder, Zuko Mandlakazi share a story of a family if five, with only one hearing person in the house. Mandlakazi said that people in the neighburhood knew this and they would wait for the family to sleep and then break into the house.
These unpleasant events made him create a solution that allows the parents, who are both deaf, to feel the potential danger. The Sensor band is a two part device, in the case of the family, one part is placed on the door handle while the other is worn as a wrist band. The device placed at the door sends a signal to the wrist band when it detects movement on the door handle, this then causes a vibration which will wake the individual up.
This can work on anything from keeping your car safe, monitoring a sleeping baby as well as ensuring that you do not burn those scones in the oven.
Unveiling South Africa’s latest animation studio
The event was beautiful, from the set up to the food, the unveiling of its latest offering was the cherry on top. The Mollo Animation Studio was unveiled on Friday the 26th o November 2021. Mollo is a Setswana name that means “fire”, when we remove one ‘l’ the word reads ‘Molo”, which means “warm greetings” in isiXhosa. With this unveiling Tshomologong greets and invites all young aspiring animators to gather around the fire to tell great stories through animation.
This studios is not a win for the precinct only, but for the African continent as a whole. The studio already houses people from different parts of Africa.
A place of new beginnings for digital creatives
You may be asking yourself if there is a place for you at Tshimologong. The question is, do you have a digital idea that you feel like will make a mark in the digital space? if yes, then Tshimologong is is the right place for you. Lungelo Makhathini, who is part of the marketing team at the precinct said “All you need to have is a digital idea or solution”, if you are that person, head over to Tshimilogongs website for more details.
