Godiragetse Mogajane
In the early 2020s, during the Covid-19 pandemic, Godiragetse Mogajane returned to Hammanskraal, the township north of Pretoria where he grew up. Back in his hometown, he noticed something missing: many of the popular food delivery apps that had become common in South Africa’s cities didn’t operate in the township.
Townships – residential areas established under apartheid for non-white South Africans – still bear the structural and economic scars of segregation. The 1950 Group Areas Act gave the state the authority to allocate land to specific racial groups. In practice, this meant forcibly relocating black residents to the outskirts of cities, into areas like Soweto (Johannesburg), Khayelitsha (Cape Town) and Umlazi (Durban). Under apartheid, townships suffered from chronic overcrowding and poor infrastructure.
While townships have seen notable improvements since the end of apartheid, from better housing to the emergence of modern shopping malls, they remain economically marginalised in many respects. Mogajane recognised this gap in services as a business opportunity. In 2021, he launched Delivery Ka Speed, a food delivery service tailored specifically to townships, starting in Hammanskraal.
With poor road conditions, patchy internet access, and many homes lacking formal addresses, townships present complications for traditional delivery companies. Their distance from city centres, sometimes as much as 40km, also adds to the cost and complexity of logistics.
Delivery Ka Speed has since shifted to a business-to-business model. One of its clients is stationery supplier Waltons, for which it delivers stock to retail stores in townships. For Capitec Bank, it transports consumables to branches in these areas. Another major client is Spar, with Delivery Ka Speed handling deliveries for the retailer’s Spar2U home delivery service. A significant part of its business now also comes from distributing parcels for online retail platforms.
According to township expert GG Alcock, the true spending power in South African townships is vastly underestimated. South Africa’s broader informal economy – much of it operating under the radar and not fully captured by official statistics – is estimated to be worth in excess of $60 billion.
To illustrate that there is more money in the informal economy than people think, Mogajane explains that when Delivery Ka Speed launched its food delivery app, the majority of downloads came from Apple devices, despite iPhones generally being significantly more expensive than Android handsets.
He says that because people wrongly assume township residents use inferior technology, they often design sub-standard solutions. “Once we kill that perception that people in the township still use 3310 Nokia[s], that will be better for the market,” he says. “It’s sad to see businesses coming up with backward models or systems trying to sell to townships. It just doesn’t work.”
He also points to the company’s growing volume of e-commerce deliveries as further evidence. “We do a lot of parcels – upwards of 5,000, 6,000 parcels a day – into townships.”
Mogajane sees e-commerce as the company’s biggest growth opportunity. “We are pushing to get more e-commerce deliveries because we truly believe that e-commerce still has a long way to go, especially in townships,” he notes.
“We believe that the market is huge,” he says. “It just needs a business that understands the dynamics – and understands how to manoeuvre.”
Watch our full interview with Godiragetse Mogajane: South African entrepreneur unlocks township market for big business
