Incredible inventions that make 2022 look cool

Shake off last year and embrace the innovation that South Africa has to offer in 2022. Because boy, are we an innovative bunch. Seriously, you don’t have to look overseas to find new things that can completely change or improve your life in some way or the other.

In fact, South African inventions have been helping make the world a better place for some years now. We tend to come up with practical products and services, like back in 1971, when Percy Tucker from Benoni transformed the entertainment industry by inventing the world’s first computerised, centralised ticket booking system. Oh yes, we’re talking about Computicket.

Crazy, right? Oh, and in 2005, Professor Vivian Alberts developed solar power technology that uses a micro-thin metallic film instead of the thicker, more expensive silicon-based solar photovoltaic cells. Seems a bit too complicated to be impressive, so we’ll cut to the quick and tell you that her invention made solar electricity 5 times cheaper in South Africa.

Speaking of making things cheaper… It was back in 2012 when King Price was founded by Gideon Galloway, who introduced a world-first decreasing premium model to the insurance industry. Basically, our fearless leader invented super cheap car insurance premiums that decrease monthly in line with the rate of depreciation of your car. So your comprehensive car insurance premium actually gets cheaper month by month.

Here are more examples of South African innovations that could transform your new year into something cheaper, stylish, and just plain cool:

Mobile solar relief for those in need

The South African company, SolarTurtle, has developed a mobile solar kiosk that can be used in off-grid areas to provide immediate relief for people who struggle to keep their mobile phones and lights on. It’s a container-based energy kiosk, which features automated solar panels that deploy and fold away automatically for transport or if there’s a threat, like a protest or a storm.

They’ve even developed BabyTurtles, which can be moved to events, taxi ranks, schools, or other high-foot-traffic areas where people need to recharge their phones.

Elastic clip-on/clip-off shoelaces

We dug around to find something that everyone could try out. And we thought, well everyone wears shoes and this little invention promises to remove knotty, grubby laces… Now, you can add some local flavour to your feet with proudly South African, patented no-tie, clip-on and clip-off laces. For ttweggo, the brand responsible, it’s not just about the undeniable pop of stylish innovation, it’s also about saving you time and giving your feet absolute comfort, too.

Little dings and tyre things

We just can’t help ourselves. We love to invent new ways for South Africans to save on their insurance and protect themselves from expensive repairs and replacements. So we did it again. We recently introduced our little dings and tyre things cover, which combines our tyre and rim insurance with our cover for scratches and dents.

This allows you to get extra cover at a better price. When you take out our latest product, we’ll cover the cost of minor repairs to the exterior of your car and the cost of repairing or replacing your tyres and rims.

You can check our little dings and tyre things right here and find out exactly how much we’ll cover.

A glove that translates sign language

This 1 really blew our minds. Lucky Netshidzati, a 26-year-old entrepreneur from rural Limpopo, has developed a smart glove sensor that converts South African sign language into voice and text. Born to deaf parents, Lucky was inspired to make a difference and invented a smart glove that works with a mobile app. Now, when a deaf person wears the glove and signs, the glove translates the sign language into speech, which creates real-time communication between deaf people and people who can hear, specific to South Africans.

Your mind is blown, yes? We knew it would be.

Drones doing important jobs

We found out about 1 type of drone that was built in a garage in Hermanus. It’s a pneumatic firing module that shoots seeds into the soil, from a drone. This baby can plant up to 40,000 seeds into the ground in a day. In light of the fact that climate change is a thing and trees are a big way of helping the environment survive, this just seemed like a brilliant invention.

Yes, we know drones already exist, but this 1 has been successfully modified so that it can make a difference to our country’s natural environment. And who knows, maybe even the world.

If you know about anything cool that you can get locally and you think it’s worth sharing with the rest of us, then what are you waiting for? Do it!