Can you introduce the company?

Mazi Capital was founded in 2006. Prior to that, I had worked for companies such as Investec and RMB. The idea behind Mazi Capital was to express my investment philosophy whilst empowering black talent. I wanted to give back some of the skills that I’d learnt from these large organisations and train young talent to break into the financial services sector.

We currently manage about 40 billion rand worth of assets. We’ve received the Raging Bull award twice, as well as the Morning Star award. The significance of these awards has meant we’ve been compared to behemoths of the industry such as Coronation and Allan Gray.

These awards could be seen as a vindication of your business philosophy. Could you please elaborate on it?

We like to buy companies that are well-managed. We believe that good managers can take an ordinary company and make it extraordinary. In essence, we only invest in companies that have excellent management. 

How do you nurture your talent?

We believe in empowering our staff. When they join we give them shares in the company. If you give people ownership of something, they’ll look after it as if it were their own. I want our staff to feel they own the business and benefit from its growth.

What are Mazi Capital’s demographics?

At this point in time, we are majority black firm, but we also have Indian and Afrikaner staff. We want to reflect the actual demographics of the country. We bring the best staff we can. This also extends to the rest of Africa: we have a Ghanaian manager, for example.

And your clientele?

Our clients are mainly South African, but we have had investors from outside the country.

Going forward, will you start looking outside of the country’s borders?

That is definitely the growth plan for the business. We’ve done enough to consider ourselves relevant in South Africa. We have good brand equity and a track record to match. It seems obvious to us to start attracting offshore money, particularly in the African space.

Africa is a very exciting place. If you look at the continent’s demographics, we have the youngest population and GDP in many African countries is growing year-on-year. I believe South Africa is in a privileged position. We are at the tip of the continent and should be the hub or gateway given our competencies, especially that of financial services. If you compare us with Australia, for example, which is a market of 24 million people in the middle of nowhere: We have 55 million people and a surrounding market of 1 billion. Whatever we produce and manufacture can be exported into the continent. The same applies for skills.

What advice would you give to young black asset managers wanting to follow your footsteps?

The most important thing is to know what you want. Once you know what you want, you must go after it. The way to go about it is to avoid shortcuts. You should be prepared to stay the course and pay the price.

Working for the two large institutions I mentioned earlier, I made sure I was focused and earnt the experience. Often the large companies are keen to promote you in the name of transformation but I believe that’s where the trap is. When you are promoted prematurely, you don’t have depth and then starting on your own is much more difficult.

What would you say is your biggest passion? What drives you?

My biggest passion is to empower people and inspire them. To see people coming from difficult backgrounds and succeeding gives me immense happiness.