{"id":840549,"date":"2025-10-22T07:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-10-22T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=840549"},"modified":"2025-10-22T07:54:58","modified_gmt":"2025-10-22T05:54:58","slug":"internet-billionaire-who-lives-in-a-small-south-african-town-brings-big-event-to-cape-town","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/lifestyle\/840549\/internet-billionaire-who-lives-in-a-small-south-african-town-brings-big-event-to-cape-town\/","title":{"rendered":"Internet billionaire who lives in a small South African town brings big event to Cape Town"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Jan Henric Buettner, an ultra-wealthy German Internet entrepreneur now living in Wilderness, is bringing the high-profile Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour to Cape Town.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Buettner partnered with five-time World Chess Champion Magnus Carlsen to launch The Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour, a series of Chess960 tournaments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is one of the highlights on the global chess calendar and is hosted in top cities around the world, including Paris, Las Vegas, and Karlsruhe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa’s hosting of such a prestigious tournament is unique, and it would not have happened without Buettner.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Buettner is a pioneer in mobile technology, the Internet, venture capital, and luxury hospitality, and is now making his mark in chess.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He started his career as a trainee at Axel Springer AG, where he worked on interactive media and gained valuable experience in the telecoms and Internet sectors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1992, he founded the world\u2019s first multimedia online service, which later led to the creation of AOL Europe in 1995. In 2000, Bertelsmann and Buettner sold their stakes in AOL for $10 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He became head of AOL Germany. In 1997, he moved to the United States and established BV Capital, a venture capital firm specialising in internet companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The California-based BV Capital, now known as Headline Ventures, manages over $4 billion in assets today.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Between 1998 and 2007, he invested over $1 billion in emerging technology companies, including GoToMeeting, Groupon, and Sonos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2006, Buettner acquired the 400-year-old Weissenhaus estate on Germany\u2019s Baltic Coast and invested over $150 million in the property.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He transformed the estate into the globally renowned and award-winning Weissenhaus Private Nature Luxury Resort.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Over the years, he has lived in Hamburg, New York, Santa Barbara\/California, and Weissenhaus, but he now primarily resides in Wilderness, South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Wilderness is a small town in South Africa\u2019s Western Cape Province, on a coastal stretch known as the Garden Route.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour in Cape Town<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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The Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour brings together the world\u2019s top 25 chess players to revolutionise the sport, drawing inspiration from Formula 1\u2019s success model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unlike traditional chess, where the starting position is the same for every game, Chess960 randomises starting positions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carlsen has been an advocate for Chess960 as an alternative to classical chess because it eliminates the need for opening preparation.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The prize fund for each event was set to be $750,000, with plans to raise it to $1 million for future events. This is the highest-ever prize money for a chess tour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first event was at Buettner\u2019s Weissenhaus Private Nature Luxury Resort, and the second was in Paris, France.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The third event took place in Karlsruhe, Germany, and the fourth event was held in Las Vegas, United States.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The fifth event will be held in South Africa. Buettner selected the ultra-exclusive Grootbos Private Nature Reserve for the tournament.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Grootbos is located on 3,500 hectares close to the seaside town of Hermanus. It offers high-end facilities to wealthy travellers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour final event at Grootbos will take place from 8 to 11 December 2025, where the champion will be crowned.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This will be the first time South Africans will have the opportunity to attend a local chess tournament featuring the world\u2019s top players.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The expected players include Carlsen and other top grandmasters like Fabiano Caruana, Hikaru Nakamura, Alireza Firouzja, and Ian Nepomniachtchi.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Other top players who may participate are world-champion Gukesh Dommaraju, Alireza Firouzja, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, and Levon Aronian.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour photos<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Grootbos photos<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jan Henric Buettner, an ultra-wealthy German Internet entrepreneur now living in Wilderness, is bringing the high-profile Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour to Cape Town.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":840550,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9876],"tags":[71,23869,23868,23866,23867],"class_list":["post-840549","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifestyle","tag-aol","tag-bv-capital","tag-freestyle-chess-grand-slam-tour","tag-jan-henric-buettner","tag-wilderness"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840549","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\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840549"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840549\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":840570,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840549\/revisions\/840570"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/840550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840549"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840549"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840549"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}