{"id":24025,"date":"2012-10-11T00:19:44","date_gmt":"2012-10-10T22:19:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=24025"},"modified":"2012-10-11T11:22:39","modified_gmt":"2012-10-11T09:22:39","slug":"appchats-holdsworth-cowboys-dont-cry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/mobile\/24025\/appchats-holdsworth-cowboys-dont-cry\/","title":{"rendered":"AppChat’s Holdsworth: “Cowboys don\u2019t cry”"},"content":{"rendered":"

John Holdsworth<\/a>, founder and chief executive of start-up AppChat<\/a>, says that, despite \u201cchallenges along the way\u201d, the company is still eyeing a launch date of February 2013.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the MyBroadband 2012 Conference at Vodaworld in Midrand, Holdsworth said: \u201cWe have had a few challenges along the way, but cowboys don\u2019t cry.\u201d<\/p>\n

In August, the high court in Pretoria ruled in favour of Holdsworth\u2019s former employer, Nashua ECN<\/a>, finding that he had breached his restraint of trade while also soliciting his former colleagues to work for AppChat.<\/p>\n

Holdsworth said that he would appeal the judgement, citing numerous factual errors.
\nHoldsworth was the founder and CEO of ECN, a provider of IP-based next generation network services. He sold ECN to JSE-listed Reunert<\/a> for R200 million in July 2011.<\/p>\n

AppChat is a mobile telecom start-up that aims to \u201csignificantly reduce mobile tariffs and increase call quality in South Africa\u201d.<\/p>\n

Speaking at Vodaworld on Wednesday (10 October), the ICT entrepreneur criticised the current mobile landscape in South Africa for being \u201cas liberal as North Korea\u201d.<\/p>\n

He said that his new venture would cater for the niche high-end of the mobile market. He said that the corporate market is desperate for savings, wanting something “other than food cooked for them by operators”.<\/p>\n

Holdsworth said that AppChat would aim to facilitate that, with the plan to provide one broadband bill across all technologies and devices.<\/p>\n

He said that AppChat would even reimburse its customers where it was found that the group was at fault for poor service, including dropped calls.<\/p>\n

Holdsworth reiterated his desire to provide one flat rate for all devices. \u201cWe may not be able to deliver that for another three years, but that\u2019s our goal,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Technically, it is nearly possible, he stressed. \u201cIt\u2019s a question of rolling out the infrastructure and that is what people should be asking for.\u201d<\/p>\n

Holdsworth claimed that people trusted estate agents more than they did mobile operators. \u201cWe want to take the mobile market and turn it upside down and inside out,\u201d he said, adding that AppChat would aim to offer simple easy to understand mobile plans.<\/p>\n

Related article<\/strong><\/p>\n

Holdsworth to appeal AppChat ruling<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

AppChat to forge ahead?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Reunert vs. Holdsworth: High court rules<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

AppChat, Reunert court date postponed<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Holdsworth accuses Reunert of delaying tactics<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

AppChat MVNO agreement close: Holdsworth<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

Reunert trying to shut AppChat down: John Holdsworth<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cBusiness as usual\u201d at AppChat amid court battle<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AppChat founder John Holdsworth says that despite \u201cchallenges along the way\u201d the company is still eyeing a launch date of February 2013.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":24027,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[1878,64,26,66,2618,555],"class_list":["post-24025","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mobile","tag-appchat","tag-ecn","tag-headline","tag-john-holdsworth","tag-nashua","tag-reunert"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24025","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24025"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24025\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24029,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24025\/revisions\/24029"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24025"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}