The first two decades of the 21st century will forever be recognised as a time of technological innovation and progression. While it’s easy to pick highlights from every year since 2000, as we mark PayFast’s 14th birthday this month, we want to look back and highlight some important – if not memorable – things that happened in 2007 when PayFast was founded by Jonathan Smit and Andy Higgins.
Let’s take a trip back to a simpler time, when Thabo Mbeki was our President, Gordon Brown was the newly appointed UK Prime Minister, The Sopranos was the best drama series on television and Rhinana’s Umbrella was gracing our airwaves. 2007 was also a momentous year for South African rugby fans as the Springboks won the Rugby World Cup for the second time. And of course we can’t forget how in July 2007 the fate of Harry Potter was revealed in the seventh and final book of the series.
2007 was a big year in tech and ecommerce around the world as well. Sandwiched between the launches of Shopify (2006) and Magento (2008), PayFast was founded with a vision to make online payments accessible to all South Africans. And in 2007, we were in good company:
Helping South African ecommerce grow
Even though ecommerce was first introduced in South Africa almost a decade prior to 2007, with the launch of Kalahari.com in 1998 and marketplace bidorbuy in 1999, the industry as a whole was still in its infancy 14 years ago. However, as the cost of internet came down and the quality of internet services improved, local ecommerce slowly gained momentum, with more entrepreneurs moving their businesses online.
Over the years we have seen immense ecommerce growth in South Africa that we are proud to be a part of. We look forward to continuing helping our merchants receive online payments and helping them get paid for doing what they love.
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