TCS Legends | South African internet pioneer Mike Lawrie

Loading player...
TechCentral is thrilled to bring you an interview with Mike Lawrie, a pioneering figure at Rhodes University who helped bring e-mail and later the internet to South Africa.
In this episode of TCS Legends – the podcast series that features interviews with (and about) some of the leading figures who helped shape South Africa’s technology sector into what it is today – TechCentral editor Duncan McLeod sat down with Lawrie to chat about the ground-breaking work that happened at Rhodes University in the early days of the internet.
In this episode, Lawrie shares wonderful anecdotes about that time at Rhodes, and why the Eastern Cape university was able to achieve things its bigger rivals in the cities couldn’t – or wouldn’t – during the height of apartheid.
Lawrie remembers many of his colleagues at Rhodes at the time, and the role they played in connecting South African universities to e-mail, and later to the internet.
Episodes 1 and 2 of TCS Legends featured well-known investor and businessman Duarte da Silva, who reminisced about some of the business leaders that helped build South Africa’s tech industry. Episode 3, featuring Hein Engelbrecht and Carlos Vizcarra, turned the focus to the late Mustek founder David Kan.
TCS Legends is a by-invitation-only, editorially driven tech show that builds on TechCentral’s credible, market-leading podcast productions.
TCS Legends is powered by Mitel. For all your unified communications and customer experience needs, visit Mitel.com.
8 Apr 2024 English South Africa Technology · Business

Other recent episodes

TCS | Barney Harmse on building Paratus Group – and working with Starlink

Paratus Group executive chairman Barney Harmse joins the TechCentral Show to share the story of the telecommunications group’s rise from small beginnings in Angola and Namibia more than 20 years ago and how it became one of Southern Africa’s biggest ICT infrastructure players. Paratus started life in Angola in 2003,…
3 Sep 56 min

TCS | Maziv goes massive: CEO Dietlof Mare on Vumatel’s big roll-out plans

Maziv, the company that owns Vumatel and Dark Fibre Africa, plans to spend R12-billion over the next five years as its ramps its deployment of fibre infrastructure across South Africa. Poised for a big injection of cash and assets from Vodacom, which is buying a 30% co-controlling stake in the…
26 Aug 52 min

TCS+ | Arctic Wolf on cybersecurity in the age of AI

What does it really take to defend a business in an era of AI-driven attacks? In this episode of TechCentral’s TCS+ ,Clare Loveridge, vice president and GM for Europe, Middle East and Africa (Emea), and Johnny Ellis, senior director of Emea channel sales, both at Arctic Wolf, go beyond the…
25 Aug 33 min

TCS | The story behind Nedbank’s R1.65-billion iKhokha deal

Nedbank announced last week that it was acquiring Durban-based fintech iKhokha in a R1.65-billion deal that could signal the start of further consolidation in the payments industry in South Africa. Nedbank described the deal as a “significant milestone” in its strategy to target small and medium enterprises. iKhokha co-founder and…
22 Aug 26 min