Strive Masiyiwa is a Zimbabwean entrepreneur, investor and philanthropist. Born in Zimbabwe in 1961, he studied electrical and electronic engineering in Cardiff and later settled in the United Kingdom. He is the founder and executive chairman of Econet Group and Cassava Technologies. His career has spanned nearly four decades.
Masiyiwa is widely recognised as a pioneer of mobile telecommunications in Africa. After a long legal battle with the Zimbabwean government, he won a Supreme Court ruling in 1995 that struck down the state telecom monopoly. He launched Econet Wireless Zimbabwe in 1998.
Econet Group now operates in several African markets, while Cassava Technologies has interests in fibre broadband, data centres, cloud computing, fintech, cybersecurity and artificial intelligence.
Philanthropy is central to his work. In 1996, he and his wife Tsitsi founded the Higherlife Foundation, which has supported more than 250,000 orphaned, vulnerable and gifted children across Africa.
The foundation also works in health, disaster relief and rural transformation. Masiyiwa is a member of the Giving Pledge and has served on the boards of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Netflix and the National Geographic Society.
In 2020, the African Union appointed him as a Special Envoy to coordinate the private sector response to the coronavirus pandemic. He also led the Africa Vaccine Acquisition Task Team.
His honours include selection as one of Fortune magazine’s World’s 50 Greatest Leaders and election as an International Honorary Member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Today he continues to promote wider access to technology and artificial intelligence across Africa.
