Media Moves: Thabo Moloi named Red Bull esport athlete, Network International to acquire DPO Group

The Media Online’s weekly round up of people, account and business moves in media.

Thabo Moloi joins Red Bull as the first esports
athlete in Africa

Over a short period of time, Thabo ‘Yvng Savage’
Moloi’s gaming journey has taken him from aspiring FIFA player at home, to
tournament winner and now, the first Red Bull esports athlete on the continent.

Moloi burst onto the scene at the VS Gaming FIFA
Festival in 2018 – his first competitive esports tournament. Despite being a
relative unknown player, he beat an expansive field of 512 competitors to claim
not only the top spot on PS4, but with it a cool R400 000 prize as well.
Grabbing the attention of the esports community, he was quickly offered a spot
with South African esports team, Goliath Gaming.

More recently, Moloi cemented his prowess in the
game, playing alongside Red Bull athlete Kagiso Rabada, musician Cassper
Nyovest and Mamelodi Sundowns player, Sibusiso Vilakazi as a member of the
eBafana Bafana team in the FIFA eNations Stay and Play Cup.

“I play online every single day of my life,” he said.
“Leading up to
the VS tournament, I trained with a good friend of mine who is a strong and
established FIFA player himself. We would play and I would beat him, but when I
started beating him consistently, I decided I was ready to compete.”

Following his explosive entry onto the esports
stage, Moloi’s passion, ambition and focus saw him placing first in the
official FIFA rankings for PS4 in South Africa which earned him his place to
represent South Africa and lead the eBafana Bafana squad against 23 other
countries in the FIFA eNations Stay and Play Cup. Earlier this year, Moloi and
his Goliath Gaming teammates headed to the Middle East to compete in the FIFA
eChampions League Qualifiers, although he wasn’t given the opportunity to prove
his mettle as the competition was halted due to the rapid spread of the global
pandemic. 

Petula El-Kindiy lands a new show on
YFM after submitting a demo

Youth radio stationYFM has announced Petula El-Kindiy has taken over the early
morning (3am – 5am) slot on weekdays and breakfast (6am – 10am) on Saturdays
with her show, The Morning Essentials.

El-Kindiy, who is from Botswana, completed her degree in media studies at Rhodes University in 2018 and found her passion for radio at the youth station, Yarona FM.   

At age 23, she moved to Gabz FM in
Gaborone where she worked as a DJ. She then moved to the Eastern Cape and
worked at community radio station, Bay FM. She left the coastal city of Port
Elizabeth, for Jozi, and has been working with YFM as a freelancer since 2019
on The Playground.

This sneaker-head who has a keen
interest in media, music and dance said: “Everyone at YFM is welcoming, there’s
a sense of family. I believe that I will bring my bubbly personality, which
will help me vibe with the listeners.”

Said Tumelo Diaho-Monaheng, YFM’s programming manager, “At YFM, we take particular care in how we choose our on-air talent. Petula’s experience behind the mic literally fast-tracked her to having her own show. This proves once again that YFM is consistent in creating new opportunities for young people. We are very excited about her joining us. We still believe we are the best at finding new young talent, and she’s promising to be that.”

Business moves

DPO Group to be acquired by Network International
in landmark deal for the African payments space

DPO Group (DPO), a high-growth
online commerce platform in Africa operating across 19 countries, has entered
into an agreement to be acquired by Network
International, a leading enabler of digital commerce across the Middle
East and Africa (MEA). In a landmark deal for the African payments space,
Network International will be acquiring 100% of DPO Group, which will continue
to operate under the same brand. 

Headquartered in Dubai and listed on the London Stock Exchange,
Network International is a pan-regional provider of digital payment solutions,
with presence across the entire payments value chain, delivering integrated
omnichannel payments services to its customers.

DPO Group is already a high growth business, with revenue CAGR of
c.40% from 2017-2019. This transaction enables DPO to add point of sale payment
solutions to its product portfolio, connecting DPO to acquirers and issuers
across the African continent and enabling DPO to penetrate the Middle East
market for the first time. 

Eran Feinstein, CEO of DPO Group, commented: “This deal represents a
significant milestone for the pan-African payments landscape and the customers
and businesses we serve. Combining the two companies will allow us to broaden
our offering for new and existing customers, significantly improving capacity
for Africa’s merchants to do business not only across the continent but in the Middle
East as well as globally.”

Some major changes at Biznews

On Wednesday (5 Aug), it will be exactly seven years since Biznews.com
began. “Much has happened in that time. We’ve been doing webinars for the
past five years and building up our competence in podcasting for almost as
long. Both position us well for the post Covid-19 reality,” said founder Alec
Hogg in a note to newsletter subscribers.

Outside of those pioneering endeavours, much of Biznews’ focus has
been on expanding the value proposition of Biznews Premium. “It is now
unrecognisable from Day One. Thanks entirely to a virtuous circle of
keeping the entry price low enough to ensure the widest possible affordability and
thus continued reinvestment,” he said.

Spearheading this effort is a new daily emailed newsletter, Rational
Perspective (what else?) that Premium members will receive from Monday. It
becomes Jackie Cameron’s responsibility in line with her recent promotion to
editor of Biznews.com.

Premium is the cornerstone of the Biznews vision to create a sustainable business model, Hogg said.

While the free to air site has grown into a mainstream website,
continued and growing support from our broader community has also transformed
Biznews Premium. It now offers huge value, including:

• Five exclusive investment-focused webinars a month where members participate live awith their own questions. 
• Bespoke content, both audio and written only available behind the paywall.
• Full membership of the Wall Street Journal with the same access as their direct subscribers.
• Exclusive Whatsapp and Twitter channels, including the very popular interactive stream.
• A dedicated section on the Biznews App.
• Transcripts of all Biznews podcasts.  
• Advance access to the Flash Briefing.  

Talkwalker acquires
Nielsen Social

Talkwalker,
a global social listening and analytics company, has announced the acquisition
of Nielsen Social, a provider of social measurement and audience insights
software. Nielsen Social’s innovative Social Content Ratings solution will
provide additional insights for Talkwalker’s market-leading, AI-enabled
conversational intelligence platform. The acquisition will build on
Talkwalker’s existing strength in serving global brands.

“The
decision to join forces with Nielsen Social underscores Talkwalker’s commitment
to providing our enterprise customers with best-in-class solutions across our
full breadth of use-cases,” said Robert Glaesener, CEO of Talkwalker. “With the
addition of Nielsen Social Content Ratings to our AI platform, we can expand
our offering in consumer, category and audience insights, and further
accelerate our global growth.”

This acquisition represents another success point for Talkwalker this year. With a new brand identity, a recently refreshed platform, the introduction of new innovative data visualization Conversation Clusters, and Quora data integration, the company continues to exceed the expectations of clients. The additional insights that Nielsen Social Content Ratings provides for brands, media and sports demonstrates Talkwalker’s focus on building a powerful, unified conversational intelligence platform.

Making
moves

Idols SA returns for Season 16

Somizi Mhlongo-Motaung will walk in wearing an
outfit that will get viewers talking when Idols SA returns to Mzansi Magic this
Sunday – South African proverb.

Well, it may not be a real South African proverb,
but renowned rapper and the show’s host Proverb will be back with his puns and
witty lines when Idols SA returns for Season 16 of what promises to be “more
than just a show”.

The talent show will start with the airing of mass auditions on Sunday, 02 August 2020 at 17:30 – in time to take its place on the social media trends list. This year’s auditions were filmed before lockdown in March in four cities – Pretoria, Durban, Jo’burg and Cape Town.

“As we turn 16, your living room will, from this
Sunday, transform into front row seats of the biggest entertainment spectacle,
enough to make you forget about your lockdown woes. This is because Idols SA is
back and we are really excited about the show – from the wooden mic, right up
to the live shows. This year’s Idols will be more than just a show,” said
executive oroducer and director of SIC entertainment, Gavin Wratten.

“Mzansi is proud to continue to provide a platform
for new stars to be discovered and for talent to be unearthed. I am told this
year’s Idols, dubbed sweet 16, will be ‘more than just a show’. This should set
the stage for our contestants and the show to reach new highs,” says Nomsa
Philiso, the director of Local Entertainment Channels at M-Net.

OFM launches R10k Triple Play competition

Living the real good life in Central South Africa
has never been more fun, thanks to the OFM
R10k Triple Play competition.

From 27 July to 7 August listeners stand a chance
to win just by tuning in to their favourite radio station and answering three
simple questions. Catch three songs from the same artist back-to-back on OFM,
send the keyword ‘R10K’ via telegram and one of OFM’s presenters will phone one
lucky listener back to ask three questions: the name of the artist, the names
of each of the songs played and the order in which they were played.

Each correct answer is worth R2 000, but get all
three right, and you could win R10 000.

Said Lindiwe Mtwentula, OFM marketing manager: “In
these tough times, OFM is giving away more money than ever before. We believe
that our listeners deserve something to smile about, and what better way to
spread the joy than by giving cash for something simple as staying tuned to
your favourite radio station!”

SA’s biggest board meeting – The Directors Event – goes online

Billed as ‘SA’s biggest board meeting’ The Directors Event
– futured by BCX, and part of the Sunday
Times Top 100 Companies profile – is where the business community comes
together to unpack major issues affecting the country’s economy. 

This year, because of the Covid-19 lockdown, the
sixth iteration of The Directors Event
will be presented as a live-streamed web-conference on 20 October 2020. The
theme for this year’s event is ‘Building
a sustainable new normal’.

In previous years, The Directors Event has attracted an audience of more than 300 senior management and C-level executives to a full-day conference at the Sandton Convention Centre. High profile speakers have included South Africa’s Chief Justice Mogoeng Mogoeng, Nhlanhla Nene (Former Finance Minister), Jabu Mabuza (Chairman, Eskom), Caroline Galvan (Lead Economist, World Economic Forum), and Mcebisi Jonas (former Deputy Minister of Finance), amongst others.

Panel discussion topics at The Directors Event in 2020 are:

• The
  South African economy is in ICU. How will it be revived?
• How
  will the Fourth Industrial Revolution create jobs to grow the SA economy?
• How
  do we manage climate change to become self-sufficient?

South African celebrities join the Regenesis
Markets family

Regenesis
Markets has announced that South African celebrities Faith Nketsi,
Lethabo Mathato and George Lebese have joined the company as traders.

Nketsi is an influencer, model and entrepreneur
who had her own reality show titled ‘Have Faith’, Lethabo is a motivational
speaker, radio and television presenter and actress who is well known for her
role in reality show, ‘The Real Housewives of Johannesburg’ and George Lebese
is a South African international footballer. These prominent figures decided to
take a shot at trading and chose Regenesis Markets as their trading partner.

“We are honoured to be the chosen broker for these amazing individuals who have done very well for themselves. This shows that we are a reputable company that is known for providing its clients with a hassle free, professional experience that is achieved through the company’s dedication to its core values of compliance, ethics, transparency,” said CEO Glen Howell.

Note: Edited 5.45am 31 July.