David Shapiro: Where has the South African business titan gone?

Key topics.Decline of iconic SA business leaders since the post-1994 era Global overreach and local policy failures eroded confidence and growth Weak tech innovation and regulation stifled new corporate visionaries.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox at 5:30am weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa’s bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..By David Shapiro*.During a discussion with Alec Hogg on BizNews in late November, he asked me who South Africa’s new business titans are. Which corporate leaders do we look up to today?It struck me: there really aren’t any. I had to admit we no longer have the giants we once did. It deserved study. And the more I thought about it, the more I saw three developments that have constrained the growth of visionary business minds.He touched on a critical topic, maybe without realising it. And after mulling it over for weeks, I concluded that without strong business leadership, without their vision and without their powerful voices, we’ll just continue groping around in the dark.It’s a complex issue, like most things in South Africa, and there is no quick fix. Still, it needs to change. I have shared some of my thoughts below.South Africa once had corporate leaders who were household names. Kerzner built Sun International into a global leisure empire. Ackerman turned Pick'n Pay into a household name. Joffe took a collection of underperforming businesses and transformed them into Bidvest, a powerhouse of performance. Gordon, Mouton, and Ferreira are among a long list of business giants who gave investors not just solid returns but also a sense of national pride.These leaders had presence. When they walked into a room, you could feel their authority. They were admired and revered as personalities who could inspire belief even in turbulent times. They exuded ambition, courage, and vision, showing business could be a positive force when politics felt chaotic.Yet the landscape has changed dramatically since 1994. Three vital trends have restrained the economy: managerial overreach abroad, political rent‑seeking at home, and a frustrating stagnation in tech innovation. Together, they have chipped away at confidence, suppressed aspiration, and left South Africa toiling instead of booming.Many companies from that past era are still around, but they’ve lost that founder‑driven dynamism. With that, the JSE has transformed from a stage for champions into a battleground for fighters. Pep Stores, Boxer, Capitec, and We Buy Cars are efficient, disciplined, but lacking the charisma that once defined South African corporate leadership.When South Africa opened after 1994, boardrooms brimmed with optimism about the prospects for our new democracy, with several managers believing they could replicate their local success internationally. Reality hit hard. They exported capital and imported disappointment. Woolworths’ David Jones fiasco, Sasol’s US plant disaster, and SABMiller’s sale to AB InBev became symbols of overreach. The rest — from Old Mutual in London to Tiger Brands in Nigeria — followed the same script.Exchange controls had kept businesses at home, allowing them to flourish in a sheltered environment. Still, when the doors opened, management, believing they could conquer the world, discovered the hard way that domestic dominance didn’t easily translate into global success. They were expanding, but without applying the founder instincts that had once guided their paths. Armed with spreadsheets and consultants, they marched on with anticipation but ended up retreating without glory.The issues led to a decline in confidence. Instead of celebrating new winners, we were producing Business School case studies. The lesson was clear. You cannot manage your way into greatness; it takes awareness, perception, and building.After 1994, the new government invited businesses not just to rake in profits but also to step up and help right past wrongs. Policies around shareholding, procurement, and labour were introduced to uplift the previously disadvantaged. The intent was noble. The execution proved costly.Instead of attracting capital inflows, the rules often enriched a narrow, politically connected elite. Empowerment deals became vehicles for rent‑seeking rather than broad‑based growth. Procurement mandates raised costs. Labour rigidity discouraged investment. The Mining Charter created uncertainty in a sector that once defined South Africa. Strikes in mining and manufacturing scared off capital inflows. Government policies, while well‑intentioned, contributed to South Africa’s anaemic growth, which has averaged under 1% compared with 4–5% in other emerging markets.Furthermore, we moved away from the days when corporate leaders could stand alongside politicians as equals. Nowadays, managers tiptoe around policy, framing an economy that crawls rather than leaps forward. Low growth has become structural, with businesses spending more time navigating regulations than building their futures.Meanwhile, countries like the US, which gave us tech titans like Apple, Amazon, and Alphabet, and Asia with giants like Samsung and Tencent, are surging ahead. At the same time, South Africa seems stuck in its old economy. The venture capital environment in South Africa is thin. R&D spending is negligible. Rather than sparking new ideas, regulations stifle creativity. Napers is the rare exception, thanks to its Tencent stake. But even that success was more a fortunate accident than deliberate strategic planning. We cling to mining, retail, and banking as our institutional pillars, while tech innovation passes us by. Today’s survivors cater mostly to low-income consumers. They are efficient and profitable, but do not project the same innovative energy we used to see.So here we are. The post‑1994 era has been marked by three main constraints – managerial overreach abroad, political rent‑seeking at home, and the lack of technological advancement. These factors have turned once-great leaders into compliance officers, leaving us with mass-market discounters instead of innovative trailblazers.South Africa has not run out of talent. It has run out of conditions that allow the skilled to flourish. The question is not whether South Africa can produce another Kerzner or Ackerman. The question is whether the environment will enable the next generation to rise. Until those conditions improve, South Africa’s boardrooms will remain filled with managers rather than business leaders. And the economy will remain a story of clearance sales, not moonshots..*David Shapiro’s official title is chief global equity strategist at Sasfin Wealth. He is better known as South Africa’s Favourite Stockbroker.

David Shapiro: Where has the South African business titan gone?

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