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Strive Masiyiwa

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Strive Masiyiwa (aka "Bill Gates of Africa") is a Zimbabwean businessman and cellphone pioneer, founding Econet Wireless.

Strive Masiyiwa was born in what was Southern Rhodesia in 1961. He went to High school in Scotland; he gained a degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering (Cum Laude) at the University of Wales, returning to newly independent Zimbabwe in 1984, where he took a job with the state-owned telephone company. But he grew frustrated with the bureaucracy and formed his own engineering company. He applied for the country's first mobile-phone license yet had to fight all the way to the supreme court before he could connect his first subscribers in 1998.

His privately held company, Econet Wireless, generates revenue of more than $300 million a year, making it one of Africa's five largest telecom companies. Econet's operation includes cellular and fixed-line businesses in Zimbabwe, Malta, Lesotho and Botswana. It owns the leading VSAT business in Morocco and an Internet video and audio streaming business servicing 60 radio stations in the United States and Africa. The company also owns a 3G license in Australia. In New Zealand Econet will soon launch that country's third GSM network; and Britain, where Masiyiwa is targeting the niche market of African expatriates.

He was also the publisher of the Daily News, Zimbabwe's only independent newspaper, shut down by the government in late 2003.

In 2002 he was named to Time Magazine's Global Business Influentials List.

Strive resides in Johannesburg with his wife and children. He is a devoted Christian.

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