Good day, welcome to our latest newsletter! We hope this issue finds you well and excited for the start of a brand new Formula One season.

Today marked the first race of the year, and we couldn't be more thrilled to share the excitement with you. The race was underway a few hours ago, with drivers from around the world vying for the top spot on the podium.

As always, there are a lot of variables to consider when it comes to predicting the outcome of the F1 season. Will it be a battle between the top teams, or will we see some surprises from underdogs? Will the weather play a role in the proceedings, or will the conditions be perfect for a high-speed showdown?

Whatever the outcome, we can be sure that this year's Formula One season is set to be one of the most exciting yet. So buckle up, get ready for some high-octane action, and let's see who comes out on top! Let us know of which F1 team you support or the one you think will turn out on top of the championship. And, also let us know if you would like us to write an article about F1. The editorial team here at Revolox is rooting for Mercedes.

Thank you for your continued support. Enjoy☕🧡!!!

Business

LEFA achieve a significant milestone of 200 000 rides on it’s app

LEFA, a local ride-hailing company, has achieved a significant milestone by completing more than 200,000 successful app rides. The founder and managing director of LEFA, Melkies Ausiku, attributed the achievement to the company's commitment to high standards for its customers, including safety, reliability, and convenience. LEFA has strict vetting procedures for its drivers and vehicles to ensure that every ride is safe and secure. Ausiku also revealed the company's ambitious long-term plans to expand its transportation network to other towns within Namibia and neighboring countries such as Angola, Zimbabwe, and Botswana. While the local ride-hailing market has witnessed the entry of international companies such as Yango and InDriver, Ausiku remains confident that the Namibian ride-hailing market has tremendous potential and is large enough to accommodate multiple players. However, he noted that all shuttle operators should adhere to the same rules and regulations to ensure a level playing field for all. Ausiku also highlighted the challenges faced by the sector, including competition from unlicensed, illegal operators, lack of investments to scale the business, and high transaction costs. LEFA places a strong emphasis on sustainability and reducing its carbon footprint and is looking at plans to integrate electric vehicles into its fleet.

FirstRand Namibia Acquired OUTsurance Namibia

FirstRand Namibia has completed the acquisition of OUTsurance Namibia and has rebranded the short-term insurer to FNB Insurance. The rebranding comes after the financial services group received the necessary regulatory approvals for the deal. FirstRand Namibia's CEO, Conrad Dempsey, said the vision is to build a globally competitive Namibia, and to achieve this, they need to find ways to make life easier for customers and create access to growth opportunities. The name change will not affect existing customer policies, OUTbonus values, or monthly premiums. FNB Insurance CEO, Georg Garrels, added that the transition is seamless, and they will continue to focus on strong customer relationships, responsiveness, innovative products, quality service, and additional value-added services to maximize returns for customers, stakeholders, and shareholders. FirstRand Namibia's portfolio of financial services businesses includes FNB Namibia, RMB Namibia, WesBank Namibia, Ashburton Investments Namibia, and PointBreak Wealth Management.

Pick n Pay Namibia launched its Value Retail Brand, Supa Shop

Pick n Pay Namibia has launched its value retail brand, Supa Shop, in response to changes in consumer needs. The brand is aimed at the growing middle-to-lower income shopper and allows the company to operate with more flexibility in terms of look and feel, as well as lowering the cost to serve while boosting product availability. The operational arrangement between Supa Shop and Pick n Pay allows for the quantities and pack sizes demanded by the shopper base. At present, Pick n Pay Namibia only has one operational Supa Shop, a concept store, which will determine the way forward. The location was chosen due to its proximity to a growing taxi rank, a large hospital, surrounding offices, and the community. Pick n Pay previously explored launching independent clothing stores, but found its clothing department inside the stores to be a more cost-beneficial approach. In November, the retailer announced the closure of two retail stores due to poor operational performance.

Namibia’s Trade Deficit widened by N$ 2.9 billion

The latest trade figures released by the Namibia Statistics Agency (NSA) show that Namibia's trade deficit widened by 129.9% in January 2023. The country recorded a trade deficit of N$2.9 billion, which is a significant increase from the N$1.3 billion reported in December 2022. The decline in export earnings and increase in import bills imply a trade deficit, which is not sustainable in the long run.

Namibia's exports earnings in January 2023 decreased by 27% from N$9.3 billion in December 2022 to N$7 billion. Meanwhile, the import bill for the same month amounted to N$10 billion, representing a decrease of 5.9% from N$10.6 billion in December 2022. The demand side was largely dominated by products from the manufacturing industry, with an import bill of N$6.2 billion in January 2023.

The manufacturing industry emerged as the largest exporter in January 2023, with goods valued at N$4.1 billion, absorbing 57.8% of total exports. Uranium was Namibia's largest export commodity during the same month, accounting for 21.3% of total exports, with most of it destined for France, China, and Canada.

Petroleum oils topped the list of imported goods for January 2023, with a share of 32.4% of the nation's total import value, followed by motor vehicles for the transport of goods with a share of 4.5%. Petroleum oils were mostly sourced from Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, and Singapore, while motor vehicles for the transport of goods were mainly sourced from South Africa and China.

During the same month, Namibia imported jewelry valued at N$1.1 million, mainly sourced from South Africa. Over the entire period (January 2022 to January 2023), the import value of jewelry monthly averaged at N$2.5 million, with the largest value of N$3.7 million recorded in September 2022 and the lowest value of N$1.1 million recorded in March 2022.

Tech

NaCC is investigating a Tripartite agreement involving NamPower, Telecom Namibia and MTC

Looks like Namibia's power players are in hot water! The Namibian Competition Commission (NaCC) is investigating a decade-old love triangle(Tripartite agreement) involving Namibia Power Corporation (NamPower), Telecom Namibia Limited (Telecom), and Mobile Telecommunications Limited (MTC). Apparently, the NaCC suspects that Telecom and MTC were getting a little too cozy with NamPower's dark fibre infrastructure.

Under the "Tripartite agreement," Telecom and MTC were given exclusive access to their fair share of the dark optic fibre infrastructure for a whopping 10 years. But now, the NaCC is wondering if the whole thing was just one big anti-competitive mess. The parties involved have been informed of the investigation and have been given the chance to defend themselves.

It looks like NamPower has already moved on to greener pastures by terminating the agreement last year and launching The Grid Online. The fibre network is now available to other players in the telecoms industry, and it seems to be bringing in some serious dough. NamPower's optic fibre lease revenue doubled in FY2022, thanks to five new companies joining The Grid Online at a juicy average price of N$788,600 per month per client.

Looks like things are heating up in the Namibian telecoms world! Will the NaCC get to the bottom of this dark fibre love triangle? Stay tuned!

Elon Musk unveiled Master Plan 3 at Tesla investors Day

Elon Musk revealed Tesla's "Master Plan 3" to investors, focusing on a sustainable energy economy that will cost $10 trillion. Engineers are working to cut vehicle assembly costs by 50%, the Cybertruck will ship by year-end, and Tesla's army of robots will eventually take over human labor. Sadly, investors hoping for a big reveal of a new car were disappointed, and Tesla's stock fell 5% in after-hours trading. Looks like even the world's richest person can't make everyone happy.

Get to know the companies trying to keep up with ChatGPT 

ChatGPT continues to attract attention, other companies are racing to build their own chatbots using artificial intelligence (AI) technology.

Here's a list of companies and chatbots that are competing with or building upon ChatGPT's success:

Microsoft: The company has leveraged the technology behind ChatGPT to build an AI tool that it says is "even more powerful." Microsoft's new Bing allows users to ask questions and receive annotated responses describing various tourist destinations or outlining the ingredients and steps that go along with a recipe. Microsoft also plans to add AI enhancements to the Edge browser that let you summarize the webpage or document you're reading online, as well as generate text for social media posts, emails, and more.

Google: Google has rushed to announce its own AI chatbot, Bard, powered by its in-house large language model, LaMDA. Bard can be used for a range of tasks, like planning a baby shower, comparing two Oscar-nominated movies, and getting recipe ideas based on the ingredients you have in your fridge.

Meta (formerly Facebook): Meta has developed Galactica, a language model designed to provide assistance to scientists and researchers with summaries of academic articles, solutions to math problems, the ability to annotate molecules, and more. Meta also created BlenderBot 3, which acts like a digital assistant of sorts, but has received criticism for its poor answers.

OpenAI: The creators of ChatGPT are continuing to innovate in the field of AI chatbots. OpenAI recently released DALL-E 3, a neural network that generates images from textual descriptions, and is working on GPT-4, the next generation of its large language model.

IBM: IBM has been working on its own AI chatbot, Project Debater, which can argue with humans on complex topics. Project Debater has been used in debates against humans and other AI systems, and has even convinced some human judges that it was the more persuasive debater.

Amazon: Amazon has been working on its own AI chatbot, Alexa, which can answer questions, control smart home devices, and order products online. Amazon has also created the Alexa Prize, a competition that challenges teams to create socialbots that can converse coherently and engagingly with humans for 20 minutes.

These are just a few of the many companies and chatbots vying for a piece of the AI-powered chatbot game. As breakthroughs in AI continue to make it more accessible and interesting to users, we can expect to see even more companies and chatbots enter the fray.

Quote Of The Week

"A paradox of life is that the greatest returns come in the long-term, but the opportunity cost of moving slowly is huge.

Long-term thinking is not slow acting.

Act fast on things that compound. Never let a day pass without doing something that will benefit you in a decade." - James Clear, Author of Atomic Habits