TechOps

In this episode we are joined by Regina Kgatle. She is an Electrical And Computing Engineering graduate from the University of Cape Town, who went on to build an Indie Gaming Startup focused on using arcade games as a vehicle to educating young south africans. We dive into her journey unpacking some of the highs and lows of the startup life, along with the challenge of raising funds of her startup and finding a sustainable monetisations strategy. We also touch on some of the issues in the ecosystem which limit the ability of founders in South Africa from succeeding, and finally we catchup on some of the interesting things which have caught our attention lately.

In this episode we take a deep dive in the question of why is it harder to scale a hardware startup vs a software startup. We discuss the fundamentals of how startups scale, along with some of the unique problems that hardware startups have to overcome in order to grow. We also discuss the latest Ethereum protocol update title The London Hardfork EIP1559, aimed at introducing more predictability of transaction fees. We unpack the details of what has actually changed, the fundamentals on how fees currently work today, and what impact will this update and future updates impact the relationship between miners and users in the ecosystem. We also unpack the latest update from Alphabet googles parent company in the introduction of a new division called intrinsic which will focus on Industrial Robotics Automation. We unpack what this could mean for the industry and more specially for founders in the space, along with the pros and cons of google entering this industry. 

Links:

Ethereum london hardfork:

https://github.com/ethereum/EIPs/blob/master/EIPS/eip-1559.md

Google Alphabet launches Intrinsic:

https://blog.x.company/introducing-intrinsic-1cf35b87651

In this second part we explore the philosophical elements behind blockchain. We unpack the relationship between philosophy and technology, and the need to transcend the application layers of a technology, into the more fundamental frameworks and protocols they are built on. We highlight the need for engineers to think more philosophically about the technologies they build, and by doing so, enhance the depth and impact of their contributions to the ecosystem as a whole.

In this two part episode we explore the fundamentals of cryptocurrencies. In this first part we unpack the fundamentals of the blockchain technology, and go on try to answer the core question of how it all relates with the average South African.

In this episode we provide a detailed take on our journey to becoming Mechatronics engineers. We walk you through our experiences starting out as high school learners, having a blind love of technology, having to navigate and overcome all the social, financial and phycological challenges to get into the University of Cape Town, where our journey with software engineering began. We then unpack the various computer sciences courses we took, comparing the differences in the programming curriculum of Electrical Engineering vs the Computer Science departments. We further dive deep into the various software concepts we struggled with most, and provide our personal insights on how to go from being completely clueless about software concepts, to building a strong understanding of the fundamentals, which underpin our professional careers today. We also debate the disconnect between the concepts taught in academia vs the concepts actually used in industry. We end off with an overview of our theses research projects, the joys of finally building something we personally found interesting and cool.