Gift Lubele believes in the saying "One man’s trash is another man’s treasure".
Throughout his career, the serial entrepreneur has found ways to create value, turning one type of "trash" into something else — or at least finding ways to keep items out of bins, dumps and landfills.
The founder and COO of Kudoti, a waste technology start-up, is on a mission to reduce waste around the world and meet the growing demand for recycled waste.
Kudoti (Zulu for "in the trash") uses technology to create a market for waste materials. By using the platform that Lubele has created, waste collectors and recyclers can connect with each other. In essence, Kudoti allows people to buy and sell recovered waste items.
"We’ve found that less than 10% of the demand for recycled materials is being met," Lubele says.
The 24-year-old grew up in Limpopo before moving to Tembisa in Gauteng as a teenager. "When I moved to Tembisa at 15, it opened my eyes to the fact that ‘the city’ was not what I had expected. My mother was staying in a one-room place and money was short. I knew I had to find ways to bring in money if I wanted things for myself and to continue with school."
He didn’t waste any time. His first business repurposed trash into clothing.
When that didn’t quite work out, he moved to the next venture, which marked the first of his projects to gain commercial interest. Lubele created a plastic device to make it easier to carry plastic bags.
"If you’ve ever had to walk a long distance holding plastic grocery bags, as many South Africans do, then you’ll know how painful it can be for your fingers. My device helped to ease that."
One of the business’s first clients was Momentum Metropolitan, which placed a large order when Lubele pitched the idea at an event in Sandton.
Not long after, he started a business that turned old billboards into bags; this gave him a taste of financial success as it made as much as R300,000 a month. He used those earnings to go study at the African Leadership University in Mauritius.
But his funds quickly ran out and Lubele had to return to SA, where he got a job with Dimension Data’s Internet Solutions unit for about two years.
Working in the corporate sector was an eye-opener. "Corporate taught me that, like a ship, businesses have many components that all have to work together. You need to find a way to have visibility of everything that is happening, including for the people you service, like customers."
It was during this time that Lubele came up with the idea for Kudoti, having observed and engaged with waste collectors on the streets of Joburg, who told him about the gaps in their supply chain.
His idea, which won an internal competition at Dimension Data, was to pair collectors with an app, helping to collect waste in nearby estates.
With the idea now taking shape, he met co-founder Matthieu de Gaudemar, who was also interested in recycling, through a mutual friend.
"The first day we met, we registered Kudoti."
Reflecting again on his corporate experience, Lubele says: "I also learnt that it’s good to have an engine that is adaptable and reacts quickly, or else the ship can sink or run aground when the waves of change hit it."
Kudoti’s platform has gone through several changes, moving from bikes to a logistics business — which did not work — and now a platform for buying and selling waste.
Lubele’s efforts brought him recognition as one of the 100 most influential young South Africans in 2017. Last year, Fast Company SA named Kudoti one of the 25 most innovative companies in the country.
Most recently, Kudoti was named one of the top five winners of the Nestlé 2021 Creating Shared Value Prize, for its "innovative recycling impact through technology".
When he isn’t trying to solve the world’s waste problems, Lubele enjoys writing and mentoring other young businesses and entrepreneurs.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.