A ‘netrepreneur’ is a special breed of techie, businessman and creative. He (or she) is someone who looks at the digital economy as the Wild West of opportunities, and has ridden out on a horse to find them.

Not afraid of all the change happening around us, these important individuals have embraced the continually evolving new technology and made some seriously successful businesses out of them. People like Mark Shuttleworth, Ronnie Apteker (founder Internet Solutions), Herman Heunis (founder Mxit.co.za) and Fiona Phillips (CEO of CyberCellar.com).

We’re excited to announce that, over the next three months, we’ve organised a handful of these rare and wonderful people to chat to us about businesses they have started, all happening at the monthly Heavy Chef Sessions.

This month, we’re joined by Eric Edelstein and Charl Norman.

edelstein

Eric Edelstein:

The legendary Eric Edelstein is a veteran in South Africa’s internet sector. He started Clicks2Customers.com, incuBeta.com and TrafficSynergy.com – all three businesses having received major international success.

Not to be slowed down by success, Eric is also busy with several other ventures, including SpringLeap.com.

Eric also invests in various businesses through his private venture capital fund.

cnorman

Charl Norman:

Charl Norman is the founder of Blue World Communities, which includes some of South Africa’s fastest growing and most interesting social media portals – including BlueWorld.co.za and ZoopedUp.com.

Blue World Communities has been in the news recently since they’ve just been snapped up by Naspers. Charl is 23 years old, and is gaining a steady reputation as an engaging public speaker. Charl has been featured as a guest lecturer on the UCT Graduate School of Business Nomadic Marketing Course; and is also the author of two highly successful blogs, Carblog.co.za (ranked 6th on Amatomu) and Bandwidthblog.com, which was nominated for best Tech blog at the SA Blog Awards.

Eric and Charl will be talking about their journey to succeeding in this brave new world, charting the factors behind their growth, including missteps and tipping points along the way.

Wednesday May 28th at Hatfields in Gardens, Cape Town. Phone Rowan at the World Wide Creative studio on 0861 932226; or email Rowan here.

Seats are limited. The May Heavy Chef Session starts at 5.30pm, and usually lasts around 2 hours with a bit of breeze-shootin’ thrown in at the end.

The cost: Nutting. Mahala. S’free…! Click here for more information on the Sessions.

Play.24.com will be there to film the procedings.

Also, keep your eyes and ears open for announcements on upcoming Sessions in the next 2 months. Great things are afoot.

Cheers for now!