Two innovative young Cape Town men are using the internet and a popular cellphone service to put people in touch with driving school instructors.
Rafiq Phillips, 23, and Miguel Dos Santos, 24, are the inventors of Idrive.co.za, a website that enables users to search for driving schools and book lessons.
They are also the first business owners to use MXit, a free cellphone messaging service, to stay in touch with users of the website.
MXit business tool
Their innovation has proved such a success that they have been nominated for the Top Information and Communication Technology Youth Innovator Award in Africa.
Both are Cape Peninsula University of Technology students. They launched their website, which they operate from premises in Goodwood, in September last year.
Noticing the increasing use of MXit among school pupils and university students, they decided to use it as a business tool.
"Everyone wants the latest cellphones and gadgets. So we are using the latest technology tools to get customers," said Phillips, a MXit fan.
"It's a powerful tool. People contact us daily via MXit.
"Even some of our driving instructors are using MXit to stay in touch with customers. This is really an advantage to us."
How it works
Phillips said they had also been invited by the creators of MXit to show how they use the service.
Logging on to the website, users have access to driving school instructors' portfolios, their rates and even photographs. They can also use the site to book lessons.
Any user's email request to a driving instructor is also converted to an SMS and then sent to the driving instructor.
Phillips said they had run a similar site for tourist guides, but this endeavour had not been as successful.
His mother, a driving instructor, then suggested that they start a website for driving instructors accredited by the SA Institute of Driving Instructors (SAIDI).
"We then went to SAIDI's annual general meeting last year and did a presentation," said Phillips.
The pair started with only four instructors, but a year later, business is booming.
"It has been going brilliantly," said Dos Santos.
Instructors pay a small monthly fee to use the site, while users access it for free.
Dos Santos said the website was successful because they were able to keep in touch with their users via email, SMS and MXit.
"If they don't get help from instructors we then put them in touch with someone else or see how we can help them," he said.
This invention was adding value to people's lives, Dos Santos said.