Strive Masiyiwa, a Zimbabwean businessman and philanthropist, is a key player in the transformation of Africa’s telecommunications and technology sector. His career path represents a typical upward trajectory, from traditional engineering to building transnational investment empires.
Strive Masiyiwa was born in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) on January 29, 1961. His family moved to Zambia due to the political turmoil surrounding the unilateral declaration of independence by the ruling regimes at the time. He received his schooling in Zambia and then in the United Kingdom, where he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical and electronic engineering from the University of Wales (now Cardiff University) in 1984.
After graduating, he worked briefly in the UK’s computer industry before returning to newly independent Zimbabwe to join the Zimbabwe Post and Telecommunications Corporation (ZPTC) as an engineer. However, he soon left the public sector to pursue self-employment, establishing a small-scale electrical engineering and contracting company, which enabled him to build a stable financial base within a few years.
In the early 1990s, Masiyiwa recognised the future importance of mobile networks and their transformative impact on communications. He founded Econet Wireless in 1993 to provide wired and wireless communication services. However, this project was thwarted by the Zimbabwean government’s refusal to grant the company an operating licence, citing the state’s monopoly in the sector. Masiyiwa waged a nearly five-year legal battle in the local courts. His lawyers argued that the state monopoly on telecommunications services violated the constitutionally guaranteed freedom of expression. In 1997, the Zimbabwean Supreme Court ruled in favour of Masiyiwa, ending the state monopoly and opening the market to private investment.
The company was listed on the Zimbabwe Stock Exchange in 1998, becoming one of the largest listed companies in the country in terms of value and market share. This case set a legal precedent that influenced telecommunications legislation in several other African countries, encouraging market liberalisation and opening the door to new private sector entrants.
Masiyiwa’s activities were not limited to the Zimbabwean market. He relocated his headquarters and international operations abroad in 2000 due to the complex political and economic tensions in the country. He diversified his business to encompass multiple sectors within the digital economy.
The components of the Econet and Cassava Group’s investment network include infrastructure (fibre optic networks and data centres/Liquid Intelligent Technologies); telecommunications (mobile phone services/Econet Wireless); digital financial services (payment platforms and mobile payments/EcoCash); and energy and technology (renewable and sustainable energy solutions).
This expansion led to the establishment of Cassava Technologies as an international arm focused on providing cloud computing infrastructure, fibre optic networks across the continent, and data centres to meet the growing demand for digital services.
Some of his investment ventures failed, such as his attempt to enter the pay-TV satellite broadcasting sector with the “Kwésé TV” project, which faced financial difficulties and was later shut down due to increased competition and the soaring costs of broadcasting rights.
In addition to his business activities, Masiyiwa and his wife, Tsitsi Masiyiwa, founded several non-governmental organisations, most notably the Higherlife Foundation. The family’s foundations focus on several development areas in Africa, including education by providing scholarships and sponsoring students and orphans in Zimbabwe and neighbouring countries such as Burundi and Lesotho; healthcare by supporting initiatives aimed at combating diseases and controlling epidemics; and agriculture and food security by co-founding the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) in collaboration with international organisations to support smallholder farmers.
Masiyiwa also joined The Giving Pledge, pledging to dedicate a significant portion of his wealth to philanthropic and developmental causes. He has held numerous advisory and board positions in international organisations and multinational corporations. He served on the board of Netflix and previously on the board of Unilever. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the National Geographic Society. He was appointed as the African Union’s Special Envoy for COVID-19, where he led a joint procurement platform for medical supplies and vaccines for member states.
Opinions and analyses of Strive Masiyiwa’s experience are varied. Supporters and economic analysts see him as a symbol of African leadership and the private sector’s ability to secure regulatory gains that promote market autonomy and accelerate digital and technological transformation.
Conversely, other analyses suggest that his business growth also benefited from market shifts and the monopolisation of certain activities in vital sectors such as fibre optics, as well as the financial difficulties and challenges faced by some of his expansion projects.
Strive Masiyiwa remains a prominent example of a businessman who combined commercial activity with leveraging constitutional tools to open new sectors, alongside his roles in the international development landscape.
Strive Masiyiwa Quotes
“A vision on its own is not enough. Hard work and dedication is required to make that vision a reality.”
“The opportunity is in the problem. The moment I see a problem, I immediately begin to think about the opportunities that can be created by trying to solve it.”
“Attitude determines your altitude, if you have a bad attitude, even if you are way up there, you will come crashing down, and if you are still trying to take off, a bad attitude, will keep you on the ground, revving your engines but going nowhere.”
“Even as an African business leader, if you are not thinking about how we create jobs, then you are simply not relevant.”
“When you are in a business, you must join associations, (both local and international), so that you can exchange ideas, with people from the same industry, including your competitors. This is how you “benchmark”. Before you dash off to implement something, try and find out what others have done, or not done. This is really how you should be using tools like the Internet.”
