Today’s edition
Signed, Sealed
Good morning. Zambia has switched on the plumbing behind its digital government, and a JSE-listed company laid it. Growthpoint had a decent year, and the Cape Town precinct it half-owns had a considerably better one. And the economy went backwards last quarter, sunk by what we bought rather than what we sold.
One division, one building, and one small cherry on top. Let’s get into it.
MARKETS
CERTIFIED COPY
Altron just switched on a national security system for Zambia’s government, and has put no price on it
A licence application in Zambia has until now needed a printer, a courier and somewhere to file the paper. This week the country switched on a national security system that proves a person, a business or a government website is genuinely who it claims to be, and lets a document be signed online instead.
The company that built it is listed in Johannesburg: Altron Security, which has helped secured South Africa’s smart ID card for more than twelve years, won the Zambian work three years ago and has just finished it. Zambia’s telecoms regulator now sits at the top of the chain, as the office every other certificate traces back to.
The company behind it:
- Altron Security was assembled by purchase: Ubusha Technologies in 2020 for R360 million, LAWtrust a year later for R245 million.
- It turned over R411 million in the year to February, inside a group that took R9.6 billion.
Altron hasn’t disclosed what the Zambian contract is worth, but the bigger opportunity is what follows. Altron sees Zambia as the first step towards selling this digital security infrastructure to more governments across Africa.
HARBOUR MASTER
The V&A Waterfront earns nearly three times as much per square metre as everything else Growthpoint owns
Growthpoint is South Africa’s biggest property company. It owns 453 buildings worth R160.1 billion, from office parks in Midrand to La Lucia Mall in Durban. Results for the year to June, out on Wednesday morning, put the cash it can hand shareholders up 4.3% a share, which is solid without being exciting. One of the 453 is the V&A Waterfront in Cape Town, owned half by Growthpoint and half by the Public Investment Corporation and carried in the accounts as a single property. That half did considerably better than the rest.
Rent is where the precinct separates itself. Tenants there pay a weighted average of R499.07 per square metre a month, which includes the running costs and municipal rates they pay back, against R176.00 across the whole of Growthpoint’s South African portfolio. Retail across the rest of the group, the closest thing to a fair comparison, manages R252.67. The precinct is 99% let and took R4.35 billion of revenue over the year. Growthpoint’s share of what it paid out rose to R964.7 million, a fifth more than the year before.
Hotels, tourism and leisure the precinct runs itself now bring in 20% of its income, up from 16%. More of Growthpoint’s year turns on how many visitors arrive.
BAGEL BITE
What is the largest ocean on Earth?
A. Pacific Ocean
B. Atlantic Ocean
C. Indian Ocean
DOING THE ROUNDS
South Africa’s economy went backwards between April and June, for the first time in six quarters. Stats SA put the fall at 0.2% on Tuesday, a little worse than economists had pencilled in. Households and the government both lifted their spending over the quarter, and businesses added to their stockpiles. Trade is what sank it: imports grew several times faster than exports, and net exports alone took 1.1 percentage points off growth. Capital spending fell for a second quarter running. Full story →
Super Group’s South African dealerships are selling a very different set of cars than they were a year ago. Chinese and Indian brands accounted for 33.8% of the new vehicles they sold in the year to June, up from about a fifth. Sales in those brands nearly doubled. The group kept opening outlets for Chery, GWM and Mahindra among others, and now runs 31 dealerships carrying Chinese and Indian badges. Cheaper cars sell on thinner margins, and the division’s operating margin slipped to 3.5%. Full story →
Takealot has taken its own name off its own boxes. Through Heritage Month, parcels are arriving with the name translated into each of South Africa’s twelve official languages, Vatbaie in Afrikaans, Thath’okuningi in isiZulu. There is a live website for each one, including a South African Sign Language version. Chief marketing officer Karla Levick called a logo one of the most valuable things a company owns. Nothing else changes: the checkout and the company are still Takealot, and the boxes go back in October. Full story →
Cherries are a small business in this country, and they have just been let into the biggest market of all. Agriculture minister Willie Aucamp signed a protocol in Beijing on Tuesday, opening the market to local growers for the first time. China imported about 586 900 tonnes of cherries last year and paid roughly R53 billion for them. South Africa produced 3 006 tonnes in 2025 and sells about a tenth of a percent of the world’s cherry exports. Government expects the opening to add around 600 jobs. Full story →
WEATHER
BAGEL GAMES
Have you got what it takes to win today’s Wordle? Play here →
THE ANSWER
As for the Bagel Bite, the answer is: A. Pacific Ocean
The Pacific stretches from the Arctic in the north down towards Antarctica, and from Asia and Australia across to the Americas. It is not only the widest ocean but also the deepest, containing the Mariana Trench, the lowest known point on the planet. It holds more than half of all the free water on Earth. Its name comes from a word meaning peaceful, given by early explorers who found its waters calm.
That’s your Thursday sorted. Enjoyed it? Forward it on, a friend can subscribe in a click. Written by the Business Bagel crew.