South African entrepreneur Hloni Theko in 2017 announced that he had, through his investment vehicle, acquired 51% equity in VeryKool Africa, and would be bringing global company VeryKool’s new line of handsets and accessories into the country.
Theko is co-founder and MD of Pretune Technologies which has interests in technology, logistics and engineering.
VeryKool’s handsets and accessories are now available in South Africa.
“The deal took a few months to conclude, and Craig Herr (former sales and product manager at AG Mobile) was the key facilitator, as he previously held the majority shareholding in VeryKool Africa. Herr proposed the partnership, after he had initially acquired the rights to bring the products into Africa. He was hoping to draw on the extensive experience I have in the telecoms industry, which ranges from provision of broadband infrastructure for ISPs to also understanding end-user patterns in consumption of data and voice products, as well as how they purchase these products. At this point, the financial details have to be kept private,” Theko said in an interview with ITWeb.
Here is what you should know about the launch.
1. VeryKool is owned by American InfoSonics Corporation. Their products are regarded as an alternative to expensive smartphones and are sold in over 20 countries globally including the United States, Latin America and the Caribbean.
2. In South Africa the phones are available at Ackermans and Shoprite stores in South Africa. “Our entry-level smartphones are retailing at R849 and our handset range is affordable to all. Our return rate is comparable to Apple, Samsung and Huawei, meaning the quality of our devices is very high,” Theko says.
3. Since its launch, Verykool Africa has introduced the 3G/LTE smartphone and the Verykool s5019 Wave.
4. Expansion is in the cards for the company, says Theko. “There are plans to expand to other parts of the continent. We already have a presence in Namibia and we are targeting having a presence in the whole SADC region by June 2018, and cover most of the continent, if not all of it, by mid-2019,” he said in the ITWeb interview.
5. According to Theko, the target market is primarily the youth segments, who are looking for an affordable alternative to “premium cellphone services and have comparable speed to the premium brands”.
6. There are also plans to manufacture some of the devices locally, Theko said: “We also have plans to localise the production of some of our devices, with plans to build a local manufacturing plant. We also aim to introduce a programme to assist local developers and the general public, which will want to develop apps, with the best being preloaded on to our future devices.”
