Pule appointed CFO at Liquid SA
Lerato Pule, the former finance chief at mobile operator Cell C, has been appointed CFO at Liquid Intelligent Technologies SA.
On Tuesday, Liquid — a unit of Zimbabwean businessman Strive Masiyiwa’s Cassava Technologies — said Pule will take up the reins of its SA operations from February next year.
Liquid is one of the biggest telecom and technology infrastructure firms on the African continent.
Pule resigned as
Cell C’s CFO in August less than a year into the job, one of a series of departures from the mobile operator this year.
A qualified chartered accountant and former CFO of Telkom’s small and medium enterprises business, Pule replaced former Cell C CFO Zaf Mahomed at the start of September 2022.
Deon Geyser, CEO of Liquid’s SA business, said Pule “is an accomplished and wellestablished CFO with an extensive understanding of the industry in which we operate ...
“She will be instrumental in overseeing Liquid SA’s financial strategy as the organisation continues to build on its vision of a digitally connected future that leaves no African behind while enhancing shareholder value”. Pule holds an honours degree in accounting and has more than 16 years of experience in financial business management at the operational and strategic level.
Liquid has a sizeable war chest and has been driving much of Cassava’s expansion in Africa. That was bolstered further in 2022 through a $50m investment from British company C5 Capital.
In 2021, the World Bank’s International Finance Corporation partnered with Liquid to expand its data centre capacity and roll out fibreoptic cable on the continent. The International Finance Corporation said its equity and debt investments in Liquid amounts to about $250m.
In February the same year, Liquid raised $840m through a bond issue on the Euronext Dublin stock exchange for investment in new infrastructure, data centres and new technologies.
The group’s Africa Data Centres unit is reported to be spending just under R8bn to the end of 2024 to expand its operations, half of which is earmarked for projects in SA.