Jacques Van Den Berg Email & Phone Number

Johannesburg, Za

As Chief Operating Officer of FORUS Digital is my job to help operationalise the platform to ensure interoperability between our channel partners across Africa and integration between our technology providers to provide a seamless experience, breaking away from legacy systems that collectively is keeping our continent from reaching its full potential.

Magnacanna was a privately funded self-built medical cannabis facility. Local staff were trained on how to build a sophisticated facility to great success. Regrettably, the project did not survive Covid 19, as private investors could bot maintain their commitment to the project.

MINFIND aggregates over 29000 curated products from over 30 reputable vendors world-wide, proving that our systems Trademesh facetted product database is scaleable on a modern reactive user interface.

Trademesh is now in the past. It was a great project and we did some amazing things that massive companies are now going to do much better. We had configurable objects, connectors, flexible BPM processes all embedded in an immersive messaging platform. What we did not have is enough money to finish. Expensive lesson no 1099.

MineralDesk is a desktop cataloging system using a very scientific, well defined taxonomy for a niche market, namely mineral specimens. MineralDesk employs Trademesh technology, which is constantly being refined towards our ultimate objective of releasing a generic object orientated cataloging system.

Moya Homes was an attempt to commercialize Framebuild technology and in order to do this we had to position ourselves as a construction company prepared to operate in remote areas throughout Africa.Given our experience in remote site resourcing in Africa, we had no problem executing these projects. We engaged in projects in Lumbumbashi, Tete, Maputo, Nakala, Kinshasa, Luanda and various locations in South Africa. Our team handled logistics, life support and on-site resourcing perfectly.What we were not prepared for is the sudden reversal of fortune, when two of our clients passed away unexpectedly, leaving two multi-million dollar contracts in absolute chaos, effectively wiping out my investment in Framebuild and Moya Homes, overnight.

Whilst negotiating for the BOT contract with the Angolan government it was made very clear to us that unless we could prove that we had the means to construct facilities in remote areas, we would not be awarded the contract.I proceeded to invest heavily in light steel frame construction technology, in respect of roll forming machines, CNC software, factory, training, construction techniques and a range of standard designs. I was totally committed to the national demining programme and there was nothing I would not do to see it through as originally envisaged. I also saw Framebuild as way to break my dependency on the Angolan government and focus on something we did exceedingly well, namely execute work in remote locations.

Shortly after equipment supply commenced, we were tasked to provide technical support to the National Demining Project. This chiefly entailed keeping their fleet of vehicles serviceable, training their staff. We had been allocated premises for a Parts Distribution Centre in Lobito, but as we were about to deliver 12 containers of parts, equipment and tools, this decision was reversed, leaving us without a base of operations. I took it upon myself to finance and build a PDC and workshop in Luanda at my own expense to ensure aftersales support.We were then tasked to conduct a feasibility study to Build Operate and Transfer 9 training centres in various locations across Angola. The total value of the project was $253 million over 5 years. A fully itemized proposal, feasibility study and video presentation was submitted to parliament in 2009 and approved. A contract was signed, but the client failed to handover the sites. The proposal cost R12 million and included the contribution of Architects, Engineers, Equipment Suppliers, SAP and thousands of man hours from my team.

My expertise in armour and the newly gained experience in blast resistance in Iraq, gave me the opportunity to offer my services to the Angolan Government to manage and execute the procurement of armour products, off road vehicles, life support from 18 suppliers in 9 different countries. All my experience in design, quality control and supply chain management came to bear. At one point we were chartering RORO vessels to deliver vehicles!

Armed with my expertise in armour, I decided to take my bullet proof paneling technology to Iraq. I was told in my very first meeting in Baghdad that nobody wants buildings, but that everybody needs armoured cars. I was lucky enough to find a very good supply partner in the US, called PEXI and together we sourced cars from Canada, Panama and Germany.This was one of the most stressful periods of my life, since I had no status in Iraq as a supplier, no access to secure facilities and no support, form anybody whatsoever. I was in several near death situations On the flip side, it gave me an opportunity to provide a level of service and expertise in a sales capacity. I managed to prove my worth in sales, selling over 50 Armored Cars over a 2 year period to various private security companies in Iraq at an average price of $125,000 each, delivered by Air within 5 days from receipt of funds.

We were tasked to design and develop a lightweight transportable guard house for deployment to government officials under the South African Police’s VIP protection unit. The result was a system, tested by the CSIR and MECHEM to be 100% bullet resistant up to 7,62 Armour Piercing rounds and 98% effective against the devastating effect of the RPG7 rocket. 67 units were manufactured. Later we perfected the technology to stop 50 cal armour piercing rounds at 50mm groupings… All because of a policeman’s simple concept!

Using state of the art CNC sheetmetal equipment from Amada Japan, coupled with 3D modeling software from Radan in the UK, we designed, prototyped, fabricated and finished a wide range of complicated steel products. Business was a bit slow in South Africa, so we developed the UK market from scratch, staying in Inns and using public transport! Our highlight was exporting 750,000 parts per annum to Bell Fruit Games, all to 0.1mm tolerance, delivered three times a week directly to the designated manufacturing line.

Silhouette steel Palisade Fencing system was a modular light gauge steel palisade fencing system. We achieved the same strength as systems double the weight, because we employed a bespoke rolled profile. With this competitive advantage we were able to grow the business nationwide, with two branches in Johannesburg and Cape Town and several distributors across South Africa. At the end of the product’s lifespan, we had manufactured, painted and installed over 100km of Silhouette Steel Palisade, much of it still standing today.

Bachelor Of Commerce (B.Com.), Management Information Systems

Master Of Science - Ms, Digital Currency