Ben Shaw and Lorne Hallendorff, two UCT alum and both Allan Gray Orbis Foundation Fellows, met whilst studying Business Science degrees at UCT and have recently written and launched their book “The First Kudu” – an illuminating account of what it took to build a tech start-up in Africa. 

The First Kudu is a story about their rollercoaster start-up ride and in Part II the authors share the lessons they learned along the way. There are very few entrepreneurial stories told in and from Africa, and they have made a valuation contribution to the ecosystem by sharing their collective insights and reflections in doing so. 

The book has been well received and is written with humour, weaving together anecdotes and real-life experiences that equal hilarity to gut-wrenching horror. A strong thread of positivity shines through however, as the second half of the book is written as a valuable resource to others, focusing on where they got it right and where they learned hard lessons.  

Who are Ben and Lorne?
Ben was constantly starting businesses while he was studying at university.  He completed a B.Bus.Science degree at UCT and had since school wanted to work in venture capital and investment. Advice on the way was that in order to get into venture capital one had to either (a) go into investment banking and gain investment credibility or (b) become a start-up founder.  His career has led him through both! He now invests as part of EXEO Capital, with expertise across a wide range of domains, sectors and stages of business.  He also co-hosts the show Shapers, Makers, Builders & Breakers with Riël Malan.  Ben serves as an advisor to several small businesses and is passionate about mentorship and developing the entrepreneurial ecosystem across Africa.

Lorne is an experienced business leader, currently building and operating financial technology products in the education and retail financial services sectors.  He has experience in technology start-ups and previously worked in management consulting in a range of sectors across the African continent.  He studied a B.Bus.Science degree at UCT, where he was president of the SRC.  His 2023 short story “Without a Single Curtsy or Cartwheel” won an honorable mention in the humour category of the 92nd Annual Writer’s Digest Awards and his flash fiction work “Villains’ Annual Strategic Planning” was shortlisted for the 2023 Bridport Flash Fiction Award.  

HouseME – innovative property technology start-up
HouseME is the subject of the book; the award-winning Cape Town based property technology start-up that aimed to create a better world of long-term residential rentals - tackling unfair discrimination in the rental market and reducing intermediary fees whilst doing so. The core offering was to find, match, contract and collect between tenants and their landlords’ properties, adding rental guarantees, deposit-free renting and a host of other interesting products along the way. 

At the peak of the adventure, HouseME had a team of 34 as many as 50,000 users.  Although, not everything went smoothly.

The team navigated Covid-19, the first of a myriad of headwinds, and write of the many other challenges – unique and otherwise – that had to be navigated in order to build well in Africa. Sadly, today HouseME is no more – and you’ll have to read more about why in the book!

What was your experience of studying at UCT?

Lorne: Being president of SRC in 2012/ 2013 was a fascinating experience - a unique window into how UCT operates. This contributed to a well-rounded university experience, and it was rewarding when we achieved wins as a council.  Some examples of these were positive changes to financial aid policy, support for students facing financial exclusion, wins regarding admissions policies, the introduction of 24 access to study in the library, support for outsourced employees on campus, and re-introducing the Inter-Varsity sports tournament with Stellenbosch University.

Studying a Business Science degree in finance was a good experience and gave me solid foundations.  Although, I changed my major a few times, swapping tax courses for economics – a legal form of tax evasion! I was in residence – in Rochester, and Woolsack – and enjoyed the res experience, and the student social life.

Ben:  I very much enjoyed finance and accounting through my Business Science degree.  Instead of doing PGDA, I chose to go directly into the world of investment banking, which was an amazing experience. I had tried out three different businesses while at UCT but learnt completely different lessons from the biggest bank in the world.  I didn’t stay in residence whilst studying, but felt I had a full experience during my time at UCT.  I found myself in the library often and enjoyed being on campus.  I was involved in the Student Y and some development programmes and mentorships.

How did you come to write this book?
After operations at HouseME shut down, we all needed some distance.  The process of writing was cathartic – a good antidote to what had been a very draining and emotional journey. Morphing the business into a case study provided great value for our own personal learning and reflection.  It also provided nuance – and seeing each other’s different perspective helped us learn more holistically from all that had happened.  Reliving the journey in a different way provided an opportunity to acknowledge the positives and explore memories and recollections from what happened.  The project of writing down the story and our own lessons learnt in a coherent way helped to order our thoughts and made them more useful for us - and we hope for others too!

Many funny things happened while running HouseME – at the intersection of tenant, landlord and services – and including these moments in what we wrote lightened the tone of the book.    The dialogue between us (Ben and Lorne) borrows elements of fiction to bring non-fiction to life.  The elements of fun were also true to our experience in building the business – they remain a critical part of how we approached our business and our writing hopefully captures this for the reader. 

How the book evolved:
We set out to write a detailed case study for the Alan Gray Orbis Foundation as a way of giving back, because the Foundation had given a great deal to us. And then we realized there was a great deal more than just a business case study on hand, so we decided to turn this into something more.  We had always relied on international literature to learn from; but wanted to contribute to the African entrepreneurial ecosystem. We enjoyed the process of bringing together the stories – the serious and the less-serious, crafting it together in a way that we felt made it easy and enjoyable to read, it snowballed. 

Train analogy
The book uses images and the analogy of a train to describe the HouseME vision. The train analogy helps draw all the different elements together and is utilised to have something to remember the five lessons:  
1. The tracks represent the direction of the business and the importance of keeping focused;  
2. The engine represents the product you build and its fit-for-purpose qualities; 
3. Fuel is investment or revenue – it’s the funding required for the engine to run;  
4.  Your train crew are the staff able to serve customers;
5.  Carriages are the revenue-generating products or services your company carries and monetizes.

The book goes into each of these elements in detail - where they got it right and the hard lessons learned where they did not. The analogy brings together at end how best the reader can apply these principles to business. 

Tell us about the writing process?
There were many challenging moments along the way, however it really helped having two of us sharing the writing.  When one of us was up, and the other down, we could haul each other along.  Our collaboration meant bringing different strengths to the process. Even when you know something very well, discussing it, you see an alternative perspective.  We incorporated some of our dialogue into the book – which was a uniquely difficult but gratifying experience, balancing out what could otherwise have been quite detailed styles of writing.  

The book took two years from starting:  12 months of writing and probably another 12 months of editing.  We initially wrote separately and then had to bring it together which was a real challenge. We received some harsh feedback on our initial draft after our first attempts to bring it together, which gave us great direction and we refined it from there.  

A few close friends and colleagues were reading parts of what we were writing as we went along, and assisted us along the journey.  Even sometimes just to fact check some of the crazier stories – we would write it down and then have to call others who were involved just to confirm that it actually did happen like that! 

It was also helpful to work with a publisher who had experience working with authors like us –  who hadn’t published before.  

Who would you like to read your book?
•    Anyone wanting to understand structures/ models for building a start-up; reinforced as a detailed case-study.
•    For people wanting to switch to start-up, who need a relevant, African context.
•    People who are interested in SA’s business, investing and entrepreneurial environment.  Ours is not a memoir.  

Ben and Lorne created an audio book which they narrated and the first person to download was in Jamaica, showing its international appeal.

The reward of birthing a book to give back:

For Ben and Lorne, the book is about giving back to others and stimulating discussion.   They comment that their reward has been the connections post the book launch.  People who have read it are keen to engage, sometimes agreeing or disagreeing quite vehemently and then reciprocating by sharing their own experiences. It has certainly stimulated discussion.

At its core, this book is unique in business literature because it is about something that has taken place right here in Africa – real stats and data, not just theoretical (often international) advice.  It is practical, reflecting direct feedback and big picture thinking.  

The concluding chapter reflects Ben and Lorne’s strong drive to be positive and convey an uplifting message.  This is not a doomsday story lamenting what took place, rather it is an encouragement to entrepreneurs who are going to launch their own start-ups to learn from them. 

What is next for Ben and Lorne?
Lorne:  My focus right now is on building and operating innovative technology solutions in the education and retail financial services sectors. The itch to write again is also present and certainly takes over from time to time.
Ben: I remain fully involved in African venture and mid-market investment, now working with founders and management teams as an investor rather than an operator. EXEO Capital is in the process of launching several exciting funding initiatives in the small business space, and I’m thrilled to be in a position to put my founder-experience to work!

To buy a copy of The First Kudu :

Paperback at Exclusive Books: https://exclusivebooks.co.za/products/9781776443260

Audiobook at Audiobooks.com: https://www.audiobooks.com/audiobook/first-kudu-building-a-tech-start-up-in-africa-stories-and-lessons-from-houseme/741976