As more and more people leave South Africa as experts in their fields, it has one of the largest economies in Africa and is also the most industrialized, technologically advanced, and varied.
People from South Africa have achieved success in a variety of professions since they can increase their own wealth through their work.
To learn more about how the people of South Africa have prospered over time, you may read one of our pieces about the richest comedians in that nation.
Additionally, South Africa is home to some of the most powerful persons, who have riches and fortune that would make any country envious. These are South Africa’s wealthiest men.
South Africa’s economy has grown significantly during the past two decades as a result of the nation’s aggressive industrialization plans.
Men with innovative and entrepreneurial skills who have significantly altered the scope of the country’s economy are at the center of this industrialization.
No one can dispute the fact that the majority of these men currently rank among the wealthiest persons in South Africa.
No other person in the nation has had the kind of positive economic impacts as these men have in various economic sectors.
We’ll examine each of the individuals who made the list of the wealthiest men in South Africa in this article, as well as how they got to have such enormous power and fortune.
10 Richest Men In South Africa
10. Lauritz Dippennaar – $850 Million
Lauritz “Laurie” Dippenaar is an entrepreneur and a self-made billionaire who began his business career at the very bottom and built an excellent business portfolio and career that has taken him to the very top of the South African food chain. Lauritz “Laurie” Dippenaar started his business career right from the bottom and built an excellent business portfolio and career that has taken him to the very top of the South African food chain
Lauritz began his professional life as a qualified accountant with KPMG after completing his Master of Commerce degree at the University of Pretoria. Lauritz spent his entire life in South Africa, where he was born and raised.
After spending more than three years working in a variety of jobs for a variety of organizations, including the Industrial development corporations of South Africa, Lauritz ultimately came to the conclusion that it was time for him to establish his own business brand.
As a result of this, he ended up founding the company Rand Consolidated Investing along with other investors such as Gerrit Ferreira and Paul Harris.
This corporation specializes in business and investment banking, a field that was just beginning to establish itself in the country at the time this company was founded.
9. Jannie Mouton – $1.2 Billion
Not only does Jannie have a gift for business and an eye for it, but he also has a lot of perseverance and a never-ending drive to succeed in the business world, which has helped him become one of the wealthiest men in Africa.
This is due to the fact that Jannie’s professional career was never the easiest. Despite this, he was able to put all of the challenges in his past behind him and concentrate on methods to become better at what he loves doing.
His first job in the business world was as an articled clerk at PwC, and it was there that he launched his entrepreneurial career.
After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in accounting from Stellenbosch University in 1973, he went on to achieve the requirements necessary to become a certified chartered accountant. He is now a qualified chartered accountant.
In spite of the fact that he had secured a position as managing partner with Stockbroker Senekal, he was terminated for reasons that were not made clear. As a result of this, he established his own business, which came to be known as the PSG group.
8. Christoffel Wiesse – $1.3 Billion
Through his expertise in the consumer retail industry, Christoffel Wiesse has worked his way up to the ranks of some of the wealthiest persons in South Africa.
Christoffel relocated to Pepkor, a discount clothes business that was developed with the help of his parents, to practice law for a few years after getting his Bachelor of Arts degree from the university. Pepkor was founded by Christoffel.
Before he resigned from his position, he had been serving as the director of the company.
Christoffel’s knowledge and experience in the consumer retail industry were invaluable to Shoprite as they established their supermarket chain across South Africa.
From a value and net worth of $122,000, this grocery chain has grown into a firm that is worth multiple billions of dollars and is recognized all over the world.
Because of his strategic planning and growth into other locations by purchasing already established but failing retail enterprises, the company increased in size.
7. Allan WB Gray – $1.5 Billion
Allan William Buchanan Gray is a wise billionaire who amassed his wealth through a succession of investments that, taken together, are worth an enormous amount today.
After finishing his education at Harvard University in the United States of America, Allan made the decision to work for an asset management company in the United States of America known as Fidelity management and research.
After working for the company for almost to a decade, when the nation was in the midst of an economic crisis in 1962, he was recognized as a successful contrarian investor.
Allan made the decision to launch his own business in South Africa, where he was living at the time. He moved to a new location in 1973.
His new company, which he named Allan Gray Ltd. and used to launch an investment consulting service, was named after him.
In the end, he made the decision to transform the business into a full-fledged investment and management firm by transferring the portfolio there.
In addition to this, he established an additional business known as Orbis Investment management to assist in the management of the company’s foreign operations.
6. Stephen Saad – $1.7 Billion
Stephen is one of the most well-known billionaires in South Africa because he is the owner of Aspen Pharmacare, which is the company that produces the most generic pharmaceuticals across the entirety of Africa.
Stephen began his work in the pharmaceutical industry by joining Quickmed, a company that distributes prescription medications.
During the time of apartheid, these businesses concentrated their efforts on black townships.
A few years later, Stephen made the decision to sell his shares in Covan Zurich in order to raise funds for the establishment of his own company.
At that time, it was believed that the aggregate value of all of his shares amounted to $3.5 million.
He was had to enter into a partnership with Gus Attridge, who was also credited as the company’s co-founder, in order to establish the business that would later become known as Aspen Pharmacare. While Stephen was the company’s CEO, Gus was given the title of deputy CEO to act in Stephen’s stead.
5. Michiel Le Roux – $1.9 Billion
Michiel is not a particularly well-known figure in South Africa, and the vast majority of people are unaware that he was instrumental in the establishment of Capitec Bank, which is today one of the most successful financial institutions in the country.
Late in 2001, the establishment of this bank was motivated by a desire to promote the development of an improved method of banking and to facilitate the appearance of simpler transactions between clients and business proprietors.
Because of his revenues, Michiel is now considered to be one of the wealthiest individuals in South Africa, and his net worth continues to increase over the course of time.
Michiel left his position as the CEO of the company in 2004, but he continues to serve as the Chairman of the board and retains as much as an 11% share in the business that he founded.
Before he established the Capitec bank, he worked for almost half a decade at a smaller regional bank in Hinterland. This was before he established the Capitec bank.
Because of his success there, he was able to both discover areas where the banking industry could use some improvement and make enough money to start his own bank.
4. Koos Bekker – $2.9 Billion
Jacobus Petrus “Koos” Bekker is a billionaire. Because of his adaptability in the corporate world.
Koos, who is now considered to be one of the richest men in South Africa, is responsible for founding and cultivating a long line of enterprises that have grown in net value from low to high.
Koos made the decision to pursue an MBA degree at Columbia Business School after working in advertising for a number of different brands for a period of two years.
During the presentation of his proposal paper, he ran into a few pals, and together they came to the conclusion that they should launch a pay television service.
M-net was the name that would eventually be given to the Pay Television.
This corporation has a number of subsidiaries, one of which being MultiChoice, which has developed into the most successful pay television provider in Africa.
This company’s products and services are now available in more than 130 countries across the globe.
The swift expansion of this service across Africa had an immediate and direct impact on Koos’s personal wealth, as well as the wealth of other people connected to the founding of that company.
3. Patrice Motsepe – $2.9 Billion
Patrice is a successful businessman who became very wealthy through his investments in the gold mining industry.
Motsepe’s business acumen was able to help establish methods that helped scale the firm to greater heights, which allowed the business to begin as a small-scale business franchise and eventually expand.
Given the importance of the industry in South Africa, a successful expansion of his company led to a sizeable increase in his overall wealth. He is now considered to be one of the wealthiest persons in South Africa.
Motsepe capitalized on the decline in the price of gold by making a purchase from AngloGold of some of their less profitable gold mines.
At that time, he had the opportunity to begin with a total of six mine shafts, each of which was valued at an astounding $8 million at the time.
Even though he had to take out a loan in order to purchase these shafts, he made sure to pay back the money as soon as possible. After settling all of his financial obligations, Motsepe establishes the mining company that would later become known as African Rainbow Minerals.
2. Johann Rupert – $7. 1 Billion
Johann began his career in business by working as an intern at Chase Manhattan for a period of time totaling a few years.
In addition to that, he worked at Lazard Freres as an apprentice for more than three years. Johann thought that he had obtained sufficient experience to launch his own business brand after working as an apprentice in the United States for a cumulative total of five years.
Following this, he made the decision to go back to South Africa and establish the Rand Merchant Bank.
Johann made the business decision to combine the Rand Merchant bank with the recently established Rand Consolidated Investments to become RMB Holdings as a calculated step toward taking the financial institution to new heights.
In the same year, he also founded the Compagnie Financiere Richemont and was appointed to the position of Non-Executive Director of Rothmans International plc.
Because of his many accomplishments during that year, the Sunday Times named him “Businessman of the Year.”
Today, the value of his business holdings exceeds a billion dollars, and he can easily count himself among the wealthiest persons in South Africa.
1. Nicky Oppenheimer – $8 Billion
With a remarkable net worth of $8 billion, Nicky is one of the wealthiest persons in South Africa and is at the top of the list of the country’s richest men.
If the business magnate had not taken early retirement a few years ago, this number would have been a significant amount higher.
After having worked for the company for more than 6 years, he was promoted to the position of director at Anglo American in 1974, which is considered to be the pinnacle of his professional career.
His successes while serving in the capacity of director enabled him obtain the position of deputy Chairman at the corporation in the year 1983.
After serving the company in the role of deputy chairman for more than 17 years, Nicky made the decision to conclude his stint there by retiring in order to take on the role of a non-executive director for the company.
After that, Nicky became the Deputy Chairman of both the diamond trading firm and De Beers Consolidated Mines in addition to his previous post as Chairman of the Diamond Trading Company.
After working for both diamond mining firms for a period of time, he eventually rose up the ranks to become Chairman of both companies.
