Please Call Me creator Nkosana Makate, Vodacom set for fresh arguments in Supreme Court of Appeal case
Nkosana Makate pivotal Supreme Court of Appeal court battle with Vodacom over his Please Call Me invention will be heard in November.
Image: Timothy Bernard / Independent Newspapers
Nkosana Makate's fight with network provider Vodacom for fair compensation for his Please Call Me (PCM) invention will have a sequel in the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) in November, several years after the matter first arose.
The case, which has seen court judgments handed down but no settlement between the parties, revolves around Makate's PCM mechanism that was put into use by Vodacom.
Makate argues that Vodacom owes him fair compensation for his idea, which came about in November 2000.
The matter is back before the SCA after it had initially ruled in February 2024 that Vodacom should pay Makate between 5% and 7.5% of revenue generated over the past 18 years. Vodacom appealed this decision to the Constitutional Court.
The ConCourt referred the matter back to the SCA for a new hearing by different judges raising errors with the initial judgment. It ordered that the SCA must re-evaluate the compensation amount.
Vodacom continues to stand by its offer of R47 million to Makate, which was determined by its CEO in 2016. Makate has rejected this offer and said Vodacom should compensate him as if he had an 18-year contract with them.
The cellphone giant, on the other hand, argues that he should be compensated for only five years and said it would have never entered into an 18-year contract with him.
The calculations turn on what a 5% revenue for Makate would mean in monetary terms. In terms of his calculations, based on what he believes is an 18-year contract, he should be compensated between R28 billion and R110 billion, Makate argues.
Vodacom now claims that the invention was “brilliant” but only had commercial value for a period of two months: from 21 November 2000 to January 2001, when MTN launched a similar product.
But Makate says this argument is flawed based on Vodacom’s own evidence as well as expert evidence. According to his argument, it is also irrelevant because the CEO determined that he was entitled to 5% of the revenue generated by PCM.
The matter will be heard on November 18.