Toby Shapshak

Summary

Toby Shapshak writes and speaks about how innovation is better in Africa. His TED talk on how Africa is solving real problems has had over 1,5-million views, and he has been featured in the New York Times. He is the editor-in-chief of Stuff and is a senior contributor to Forbes. He is the executive director of new mobile news service Scrolla.Africa. Toby was named in GQ's top 30 men in media and the Mail & Guardian newspaper's influential young South Africans list; and was the ICT Journalist of the Year. GQ said he "has become the most high-profile technology journalist in the country" while the M&G wrote: "Toby Shapshak is all things tech... he reigns supreme as the major talking head for everything and anything tech."​ He believes Africa is a mobile-driven continent, about which he has written for CNN, The Guardian in London, Quartz, and for Forbes. He is writing a book on innovation in Africa, looking at how the problems Africa is solving for itself will benefit the rest of the world. Toby has spoken at the South by South West (SxSW) conference in Austin, Texas, (four times) on how mobile is being used in Africa and how music is being consumed; and at The Guardian's Activate: Johannesburg on innovation out of necessity. He has also spoken at Intel's IDF conference in San Francisco, Germany's Zukunftskongress (Future Congress), Sweden's The Conference, AfricaCom in Cape Town, TEDxGateway in Mumbai, Pivot East in Nairobi, and Tech4Africa in Joburg. He has been the Mail & Guardian's technology and sports editor, ran the M&G website when it was the first news site in Africa, shadowed Nelson Mandela when he was president, and covered the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Formerly a senior newspaper reporter covering everything from crime to politics, he has been writing about innovation, telecoms, and the internet and the impact it has on our lives for more than 28 years. He has been a columnist for the Financial Mail and Daily Maverick.