Square, the developers of Square Register, a  free point of sale app has introduced the Square Stand that lets business owners easily take payments directly from an iPad 2 or 3 (30-pin connector). Once the iPad and Square Stand are connected, its overall sleek and minimal appearance looks nothing like the typical cash registers that we have come to know.

The Square Stand tilts for different viewing angles and can rotate 180 degrees so customers can easily sign for purchase. The integrated credit card swiper keeps credit card information secure after swiping.

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South Africa already has a number of great money transfer solutions. The real challenge is not getting another banking app, but rather finding locations for these applications to convert credit into cash as well as cash into credit, says Bevan Ducasse of wiGroup.

“Mobile money is growing tremendously,” says Ducasse. “Every one of the big four banks as well as Capitec has a mobile banking solution, and we have MTN and Vodacom offering money transfer services as well. The problem of how to enable people without traditional bank accounts to transfer money has been solved. If someone has a cellphone number, you can send them money.”

What does still need to be solved, says Ducasse, is the problem of how to spend money sitting in mobile accounts and wallets. “At some point you still need to be able to deposit and withdraw cash,” he says; “and everything points to the retail footprint in South Africa being the answer.”

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With its new list of gift cards on offer, Cape Town-based startup GoGifting, has launched South Africa’s largest gift card mall, online.

GoGifting, launched in October 2012, allows users to send their friends gifts using their connections on social networks like Facebook and is growing maturity in South Africa, having already become a $100 billion market in the U.S. alone.

This week, South Africa’s social gifting pioneer, expanded its gift card and voucher offering to provide 40 gift cards from the country’s favourite brands including Carrol Boyes, Pick’n Pay, Cape Union Mart and Clicks.

Shoppers can now leverage the platform already popular with a large number of users to send gifts for any occasion. Having these available online lets gift-givers send gifts from where ever they are.

“We’ve had so many requests for a larger selection of brands from our users and we’re happy to oblige,” says founder Kevin Tucker. “There’s definitely a huge gap in the market to bring gift cards to online consumers. No more trekking to the shopping centre to find the right one.”

Gift cards are available in either physical or virtual format. Physical gifts are couriered to the recipient  with GoGifting handling all the fulfilment. Virtual gift cards are sent electronically and can be used immediately.

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Emerging Stars, an online portal that offers a selection of business opportunities in emerging economies, has announced the launch of their extended online service designed to partner entrepreneurs, distributors and investors.

Founded as a television project to scout emerging countries for young, innovative entrepreneurs, Emerging Stars introduced the online portal as a natural extension of the brand.

Initially a free service utilised to generate and direct interest from its TV series, the directory became a trusted listing service for entrepreneurs, distributors and funders alike. While working on the series, the research team built a fast-growing network of entrepreneurs, investment agencies and business consultancies – along with a cache of already-vetted business opportunities.

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After the recent launch of its new mobile shopping app for Android and iOS, TAKEALOT.com has now introduced a new initiative offering customers  savings on selected products on a daily, first-come-first-serve basis with SAVEALOT Daily Deals.

SAVEALOT Daily Deals delivers two new deals every weekday (9am – 9pm) with up to 70% savings on a variety of items across all 14 of TAKEALOT.com’s departments, including Electronics, Home and Kitchen, Sports, Pet Supplies and more.

The deals page is currently available on desktop with the mobi-site version to follow.

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If you do business online, it’s much easier to make a sale if you take credit cards – but, says Peter Harvey of payment services provider PayGate, e-commerce businesses need to ensure they have the security basics right.

“If you store, transmit or process any kind of credit or debit card information, it is your job as the merchant to protect it,” he says. “If cardholder data is stolen and you are responsible, you could face fines, penalties and even lose the right to accept payment cards. The card associations are getting more and more strict about this.”

Harvey says there are three important steps e-commerce businesses can take to make sure they and their customers are protected:

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Amazon.com leaked the world’s first small-screen Windows 8 tablet briefly before removing it from its website.

As a result of the leak, Amazon revealed a number of specs about the Acer Iconia  W3-810 tablet, rumours of which first surfaced in late April.

We now know that the 8.1-inch tablet offers a dual-core 1.8GHz Intel Atom processor, 2GB of RAM, a 1280 x 800 display, about 8 hours of battery life, 32GB of storage, 2-megapixel front and rear cameras and a micro USB 2.0 port.

Its brief appearance revealed a price of $379.99.

Source: PC World

TAKEALOT.com has taken another step towards customer convenience by launching their iPhone and Android shopping apps in addition to the Blackberry 10 app launched earlier this year. With Africa’s internet users primarily using mobile devices, the apps aim to deliver an enhanced experience for customers, allowing them instant access to the world of retail via their mobile device, regardless of time or location.

“We’re not joking when we say it’s a mall in your pocket. The apps are designed to allow the user to access the world of online shopping without ever having to use a laptop or desktop computer.” Says Kim Reid, CEO. (more…)