Every shortcut a tech company takes is a loan. That’s the whole idea behind “technical debt”, a phrase programmer Ward Cunningham coined more than 30 years ago and the smartest bit of financial language software ever borrowed. In my last column, I argued that we sell products before we build them. This is what happens…
AI-powered cyber attacks are expected to become increasingly common as more capable AI models proliferate. (Image generated using ChatGPT) Conventional cyber security controls are no longer sufficient to stop increasingly capable autonomous artificial intelligence (AI) agents, following last week’s rogue AI attack on AI platform Hugging Face, says cloud infrastructure company Modal. The company issued…
South Africa’s redrafted national AI policy will not prescribe rules to industry. Instead, individual sectors will be left to write their own AI strategies off a set of national guidelines. That is according to department of communications & digital technologies acting deputy director-general Jeanette Morwane, who told TechCentral on the sidelines of the inaugural Naspers/Prosus…
In an effort to bridge the divide between higher education and real-world requirements, Vodacom, the University of Johannesburg (UJ) and Amazon Web Services on Friday, 24 July, announced they have formed a strategic alliance focused on developing highly skilled, employment-ready specialists in artificial intelligence and data science. Supplied image: Leadership from UJ, Vodacom, AWS and…
Hasnain Motlekar, acting CEO of BCX. Clean and trustworthy data is essential to building a digitally enabled and intelligent company, with business leaders shifting their focus from technology procurement to achieving business outcomes from technology investments. This is according to executives from BCX, Telkom Business and Openserve, who hosted channel partners, industry specialists and customers…
South African IT spending will grow 19.8% in 2026 to US$28.1-billion, more than five percentage points faster than the global figure, according to figures Gartner provided to TechCentral. The research firm does not publish a South African breakdown with its quarterly global releases. It supplied the local cut on request, following its worldwide forecast on…
Altron, South Africa’s leading multi-platform and IT services company, today announced the appointment of Collin Govender as managing director of Altron HealthTech, effective 1 September 2026. Govender succeeds Leslie Moodley, who has announced his early retirement earlier this month. Govender is currently group chief operating officer at Altron, where he oversees strategy execution, human capital,…
The AI boom is transforming national energy planning, as hyperscalers prioritise power-rich locations for future data centre campuses. Artificial intelligence (AI) is fundamentally changing the global data centre industry, with access to electricity replacing fibre connectivity as the most important factor determining where the next generation of data centres will be built. This is according…
Pavel Durov. Albert Gea/Reuters Russia’s has charged Telegram founder Pavel Durov with facilitating terrorist activities and issued an international warrant for his arrest. The country’s Federal Security Service (FSB) said on Wednesday that the charges related to Telegram’s failure to remove material “used by Ukrainian special services and by terrorist and extremist organisations to prepare…
Rennie Naidoo, Professor of Information Systems at the Wits School of Business Sciences. For the past two years, the conversation around AI has focused largely on software. We debate models, benchmarks, agents and the race between technology companies. The story is usually told as one of innovation. But another story is unfolding beneath the headlines….
