The Lion King | 9
Theme Story
Patrice Motsepe
– South African
A
t the very young age of
eight, Patrice’s father,
who ran a shop that sold
liquor to Miners told him “We
make so much money when
you are behind the counter, you
should take over the business
when you grow up.” Patrice
never took over his father’s
shop because he considered
the work too hard but instead
chose to go to school to read
law, specializing in mining and
business law.
His ultimate fate lay in the mines,
as it was from mining that Patrice
eventually made his billions,
soon emerging South Africa’s first
black billionaire.
Motsepe bought low-producing
gold mine shafts and turned
them profitable. He paid low
base salaries but offered profit
sharing bonus. He expanded his
business empire by buying up
series of marginal gold mines
from AngloGold, one of the
world’s biggest gold mining
companies, when gold prices
were low in 1997.
His publicly traded mining conglomer-
ate, African Rainbow Minerals (ARM)
has interests in platinum, nickel, chrome,
iron, manganese, coal, copper and
gold. He also holds a stake in Sanlam,
a publicly traded financial services
company.
his own company, Mobile Systems
International (MSI) in 1989.
By the time he sold MSI in 2000
for $916m, the company had 17
international subsidiaries, and
800 employees, mostly engineers
who owned 30% of the company
which they were forced to buy at
the point of employment. Many
became millionaires after the sale.
Before the sale of MSI, Mo Ibrahim
had set up a subsidiary called
Celtel in 1998 as a Mobile Operator.
His focus was on the African market
where most of the big operators
had ignored, thinking there was no
prospect of establishing a viable
mobile operating company.
He proved all doubters wrong
when he turned Celtel into a highly
successful mobile company within
five years with operations in 16
African countries. He sold Celtel for
$3.4 billion in 2004 pocketing about
$1.4 billion. His staff benefitted from
the sale again, as they also made
$500 million with about a 100 of
them becoming millionaires from
the sale.
Mo Ibrahim’s current passion is
encouraging good governance
in Africa through the Mo Ibrahim
Foundation.
Strive Masiyiwa
– Zimbabwean
S
trive Masiyiwa fought
for five years in a court
of law to be allowed
the right to operate mobile
telecommunications
company in Zimbabwe.
It was a long fight but he
emerged victorious at the
end and set himself on a
path to building one of
Africa’s biggest telecom
companies.
Econet Wireless, the
company that resulted
from this court battle is now
a major global player in
the telecoms industry with
operations in 15 countries, serves
over 25 million customers and
generates more than $3 billion in
revenue every year.
Econet Wireless has strong
employee commitment. It provides
counselling and antiretroviral drugs
for its employees and their families
who are living with HIV/AIDS. It is
also heavily involved in promot-
ing entrepreneurial activity in the
communities in which it operates
by investing in community phone
shops and payphones to bring
connectivity to people who would
normally not be able to afford it.
