Readers Digest

The first black woman in SA to own a CCTV company, Ipeleng Mkhari is making her mark as one of SA's most powerful women in business.

Cutting a striking figure in a stylish suit at her Sandton offices, 33-year-old Ipeleng Mkhari is one of the country's top 20 most powerful women in business, according to Destiny magazine. She is estimated to be worth R44-million personally, not bad for someone who started operating her own business at the age of 22.

The first black woman in South Africa to own a closed circuit television (CCTV) company, Mkhari is currently the chief investment officer, shareholder and co-founder of Motseng Investment Holdings – a multimillion-rand black-owned investment company that focuses on property management.

Mkhari is in charge of the company's growth strategy and its subsidiaries – Motseng Property Group, Motseng Investments and Motseng Outsourced Services.

The eldest of three girls, she grew up in Umlazi township outside Durban, where her parents – a lawyer and a medical doctor – both had their own practices. They divorced when she was a teenager and her father relocated to Johannesburg.

Fresh out of the University of KwaZulu-Natal in Durban, Mkhari moved to Johannesburg in 1997 to join Eskom's graduate programme. But then she received a call from an old friend. "I think you need to come see some people," she said. "They run a CCTV company and want to set up a black economic empowerment (BEE) company." Excited, Mkhari agreed to meet them. "I was naïve and only 22 years old," she says, smiling.

With no work experience, Mkhari was appointed marketing director of the new venture, Phosa Iliso (cast an eye) CCTV, and her duties included bringing in new business. "I was fortunate in that I'm a fast learner and in no time I was out there, meeting clients," she says. "I was also lucky to be working with another woman, who was brought in from the UK. She was like my mentor."

The BEE bomb drops
Six months later Mkhari learnt, after meeting the two other black directors of Phosa Iliso for the first time, that she was in fact a BEE front and that the other directors were the boss's domestic worker and gardener. "I was devastated," she says. "I didn't know what to do." Mkhari was faced with the option of quitting, but her stubborn nature made her stay. After all, she points out, she had helped build the company from scratch and she was not going to walk away after all the hard work she had put in. She decided to stay on to learn as much as possible about the electronics industry before branching out on her own. Feeling confident that she'd learnt enough, she then asked her lawyer father to help her get out of her contract. She told the shareholders that she was leaving and would be taking Phosa Iliso with her. "They agreed. I guess they didn't think I would make it," adds Mkhari.

In June 1998, Mkhari became her own boss and Phosa Iliso began operating from her father's home office in Johannesburg. After weeks of making phone calls and meeting potential clients she landed her first big contract in September – a once off deal to install a CCTV system in one of the companies owned by legendary BEE empire Kunene Brothers.

She spent months perfecting a "very tight" business plan, but eventually this secured the bank funding, which she had to repay in one month. Mkhari used the money to buy the security system and equipment needed to carry out the job, and employed a group of men who installed CCTV systems for a living, to work after hours and on weekends. They finished in less than three weeks. "I was fortunate to have a client who paid me in full and on time," she says. "I was able to repay the loan, pay the guys and still have a little bit left. After that, I never took out another loan."

However, the deal was only a sweetener and an almost dry spell followed. Although she did get small contracts, securing the much sought-after big contracts proved to be a challenge. Mkhari would tender for a contract and get turned away, but determinedly would go back and tender again.

"I think people soon realised I wasn't going away, that I was serious about what I was doing," she explains. Soon, she had built a name for herself.

The beginning of something big
During that period in 1998, Mkhari bumped into her current business partner Sandile Nomvete, who is also the co-founder and chief executive officer of Motseng, in Sandton. The two knew each other from their high school days. Nomvete was working for an IT company while also running his own business on the side. "Girl, I hear you're in business," he said.

"I would like to talk to you about investment. Would you be interested?" The two met again soon afterwards and Motseng Youth Investment, which is the forerunner of Motseng Investment Holdings, was born.

While Mkhari continued to run Phosa Iliso, Nomvete resigned from his company and sold his private entity to focus on the new venture. Armed with one big dream in mind – becoming the largest black-owned and managed investment entity in the country – a personal assistant and just the two of them, they embarked on a journey to realise this goal.

After some difficult times things began to improve for Motseng. The company secured a big deal as Mariott Corporate Property's BEE partner in 2001, forming Motseng Marriott Property Services. In 2002 they launched Motseng Outsource Services – under which Phosa Iliso CCTV now falls – an integrated security, cleaning and waste management services provider. "Our model was that with every deal we do, we should get a Motseng person to sit on the board to learn about the company," explains Mkhari. Thus Nomvete became executive director of Motseng Marriott Property Services as part of a skills transfer. In 2005, Motseng bought out Marriott's share in the business to become Motseng Property Services.

Ipeleng Mkhari's approach in business is based on three principles: courage, determination, and the ability to build and maintain relationships. "We have signed four major deals in the nine years we've been in existence and they have all been built on the strength of relationships," Ipeleng Mkhari points out proudly. "What we want is for Motseng to become the leading black-owned property management company in the country."

Valued at R150 million, there is no doubt that they'll achieve this.