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04/11/2011

The Entrepreneurship Honours students (from the Department of Business Management) are required to draw up a Business Plan for an existing business as a project each year. The goal behind preparing a Business Plan for an existing business is for the students to gain practical experience as well as ensuring that the Business Plans produced are of value to someone and not just an academic exercise.

This year, the students teamed up with Laduma Ngxokolo, an alumnus of NMMU. Laduma completed his BTech degree in 2010 with majors in Textile Design and Technology. He aimed to develop a high quality Xhosa-inspired knitwear range for amakrwala (Xhosa Initiates). He achieved the objective by interpreting traditional Xhosa beadwork into knitwear designs and using authentic Xhosa colours.

This research won Laduma and the NMMU the 2010 Society of Dyers and Colourists Design Award, an international design competition that takes place in London annually. In February 2011 Laduma was invited to present his innovative research at the 2011 Design Indaba Conference amongst six handpicked international post graduates.

Each group of Entrepreneurship Honours students had to create a business plan for Laduma’s business, MaXhosa by Laduma (Pty) Ltd and present their work to a panel consisting of Laduma Ngxokolo, Otto Lessing (a business advisor), Jacqueline Barnett (Director of the Innovation support and technology transfer) and various academics. Jacqueline Barnett sponsored prizes for the best business plan. The winning team consisting of Marinthea Snyman, Mispah Carelsen, Anh Thu Dao and Claire Boggenpoel, each walked away with R1000.

The process of creating a Business Plan from nothing was very tedious and completing it took several weeks of hard work. However, the skills learnt were invaluable as they will definitely be an asset for us in our futures. The process also made us aware that owning and managing a business is extremely tough but can be just as rewarding!” Marinthea Snyman

Dr Shelley Farrington, Mispah Carelsen, Claire Boggenpoel, Marinthea Snyman, Anh Thu Dao &amp; Jacqueline Barnett

From left to right: Dr Shelley Farrington, Mispah Carelsen, Claire Boggenpoel, Marinthea Snyman, Anh Thu Dao & Jacqueline Barnett (back).

Students visiting Laduma&#39;s facility on the 2nd avenue campus 

Students visiting Laduma's facility on the 2nd avenue campus.