From Idea To Impact With Keet van Zyl

Startup Grind Cape Town: Closing the Year with Keet van Zyl – Co-Founder and CEO at Knife Capital

Startup Grind Cape Town is proud to host its final Fireside Chat of 2025 featuring Keet van Zyl, one of South Africa’s leading venture capitalists and a key figure in shaping the continent’s entrepreneurial ecosystem.

With more than 20 years of experience across investment banking, private equity, and venture capital, Keet brings a wealth of knowledge about building and funding high-growth businesses. As Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Knife Capital, he has helped build a globally recognised growth equity firm that accelerates the international expansion of African innovation-driven companies.

Knife Capital’s portfolio includes some of the continent’s most promising scale-ups such as:

Quicket – a leading online ticketing platform that simplifies event management and ticket sales across Africa.
Snapplify – a digital education company providing e-learning solutions to schools, publishers, and students.
Grindstone Ventures – a structured entrepreneurship accelerator and venture fund supporting scale-up businesses.

During this Fireside Chat, Keet will share key lessons and insights on:

What makes a startup investable and scalable.
The evolution of venture capital in South Africa.
Building and supporting high-performing founder teams.
Lessons from Knife Capital’s portfolio and investment journey.
How to prepare for funding, growth, and successful exits.

This event is designed for:

Investors looking to discover emerging talent.
Founders seeking inspiration and collaboration.
Ecosystem partners who want to connect with Cape Town’s most active startup community.

Date: 27 November 2025Location: UVU Africa - Brickfield Canvas

This event is an opportunity for founders, investors, students, and innovators to reflect on the year, connect with peers, and learn from one of the most experienced investors in the African startup ecosystem.This event is an opportunity for founders, investors, students, and innovators to reflect on the year, connect with peers, and learn from one of the most experienced investors in the African startup ecosystem.

For sponsorship or partnership inquiries, email: startcpt@startupgrind.com

Proudly brought to by:

Agenda

5:30 PM: Networking and Refreshments

6:00 PM: Welcoming

6:20 PM: Fireside Chat

7:00 PM: QNA and Closing

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Speaker

Will Green - Co.lab (CEO)

Host

Kyle Telfer - Spark Eighteen (Co-founder (Africa))

Startup Grind is a global startup community designed to educate, inspire, and connect entrepreneurs. We host monthly events in more than 600 cities and 125+ countries featuring successful local founders, innovators, educators and investors who share personal stories and lessons learned on the road to building great companies. Our monthly fireside chat interviews, startup mixers and annual conferences provide ample opportunities to connect with amazing startups and the people behind them, tap into a strong support network, form meaningful connections and gain inspiration for the startup journey ahead. For more information visit StartupGrind.com or follow us on twitter @StartupGrind.

Complete your event RSVP here: https://www.startupgrind.com/events/details/startup-grind-cape-town-presents-from-idea-to-impact-with-keet-van-zyl/.