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Please Call Me inventor Kenneth Nkosana Makate is about to be smiling all the way to the bank after the court officially ruled in his favour.

Finally, the decades-long battle between him and Vodacom has come to a decisive end with the Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) ordering Vodacom to determine a reasonable compensation amount ASAP.

The ruling was handed down in Bloemfontein on Tuesday, with Makate relishing in victory, saying the “end is near” in this drawn-out legal battle to make Vodacom give proper recognition and reward for his idea, which brought in a bunch of revenue for the mobile communications conglomerate.

SowetanLive reported that Vodacom has to make a fresh determination within 30 days to compensate Makate for his invention as it also set aside the R47 million offer he rejected in January 2019.

Speaking after the ruling was handed down, Makate said he was thrilled as the second highest court had  “cleared ambiguities that may have existed” after the high court judgment, which Vodacom appealed.

“I think what this judgment has done is to basically provide us with a line of march on what needs to be done. So, there’s really nothing that needs to occupy my mind because I know what needs to be done. If the CEO can’t do that, we can do that for him in any event. There’s nothing ambiguous about this,” Makate said.

Makate reckons the “matter could be done and dusted before the end of this year”.

Note South Africans📍

BREAKING NEWS:

It is now official, the ‘Please Call Me’ inventor Mr Makate has taken @Vodacom and CEO to the cleaners.

IN ALL SOUTH AFRICAN COURTS!!!!

The SCA has just delivered another blow for Vodacom.

This one South Africans is for the history… pic.twitter.com/pzPuotjdpr

— #PleaseCallMe Movement (@NelsonQ_Tau) February 6, 2024

This legal battle has been going on since November 2000 when Makate, a former Vodacom employee, came up with the ‘Please Call Me’ feature, IOL reports.

Makate came up with the idea more than 20 years ago when he had a long-distance relationship with his now wife, who was a student then. Communication was difficult at the time, so Makate’s idea allowed users of the service to be able to reach out to those they wanted to get a hold of without the stress of spending airtime.

A former Vodacom chief executive promised Makate compensation for his invention, but the company later backtracked when the service became a success.

In April 2016, the Constitutional Court ruled in Makate’s favour, ordering Vodacom chief executive Shameel Joosub to make a determination on reasonable compensation for Makate. Vodacom suggested the R47 million payout, but it was rejected by Makate and his legal team as they valued fair compensation closer to R28 and R110 billion.

SCA Judge Ashton Scheepers upheld the Pretoria High Court ruling and set aside the R47m offer to Makate, saying it was “manifestly inequitable”.

Rather, the court ordered the cellphone network service provider to pay Makate between 5 and 10% of the total revenue that the service generated over the last 18 years, with interest taken into consideration.

With the latest ruling, Mr ‘Please Call Me’ is set to bag around R20 billion, with the legal fees also set to be settled by Vodacom.

It’s safe to say that Makate has taken Vodacom to the cleaners.

[source:sowetanlive]