Africa

Who would invest in an airline? The industry is facing a lot of challenges right now with escalating fuel prices, reduction in passenger volumes caused by the global recession and arguably the growth of technology that allows people to communicate and confer without the need to travel. These are things that affect airlines all over the world, but in South Africa life is even more challenging for a private sector airline operator that has to compete with the heavily subsidised national carrier South African Airways (SAA) and its low-cost brand Mango.

On May 11th the Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, together with leaders of Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and South Sudan as well as representatives from Tanzania, Burundi and the African Development Bank, witnessed the signing of the agreement. President Uhuru Kenyatta and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang led regional heads of states including presidents Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, Paul Kagame of Rwanda and Salva Kiir of South Sudan in witnessing the signing ceremony at State House, Nairobi.

In the past the port has been controlled by the Portuguese, the sultan of Zanzibar, and the British. Today, Kenya Ports Authority (KPA), a state-run enterprise, is responsible for the port. The city of Mombasa, its port and the facilities around it, as well as the railway that runs from the coast to Rwanda Uganda and Burundi are important to the economy of the whole of East Africa. Transit trade to these countries, the DRC, Tanzania and South Sudan accounts for 30 percent of the port's throughput and this proportion is growing by up to ten percent a year.

Landlocked within north-central Africa, Chad is among the world’s poorest countries, hindered by its desert climate and the fact that it has been ravaged by various civil wars during thirty of its forty years of independence. For decades the country suffered from a lack of economic investment, leaving it with one of the continents poorest infrastructure networks and a large majority of its adult population living below the poverty line.

Located in the eastern plateau area of South Africa known as the Highveld, Johannesburg is country’s largest city by population and the provincial capital of Gauteng, which boasts the largest economy of any metropolitan region in all of Sub-Saharan Africa.

Located within one of the most prospective copper regions in the world, Barrick Gold’s Lumwana copper mine is one of Zambia’s best examples of a prosperous mining operation. Situated within a stable jurisdiction with a long history of mining and boasting established infrastructure, Lumwana possess a large, high potential copper deposit and a multi-decade reserve life.

By offering voice, data and internet services over a single connection, Neotel has established itself as South Africa’s first converged telecommunications network operator. Founded in 2006 and backed up by the financial and technical clout of global communications company Tata Communications, Neotel has since become a major force within the country’s telecommunications sector.

Founded in 2005, its focus being to provide clients with management consulting and IT solutions, CONCIEL has expanded over the subsequent years to become a business tasked with solving its customers’ mission-critical problems through the innovative application of technology and expertise.

Nobody’s perfect. What quality or ability do you wish you had?
Being able to predict the future more accurately.

What is the best business book you have ever read, and why?
Mind of a Fox, by Clem Sunter and Chantell Illbury. Through scenario planning they predicted the 9/11 disaster. The book talks about enabling one to have vision to the point where one can predict specific future events.