Endeavor South Africa announces the appointment of several new board members and a new chairperson for 2025, reinforcing its commitment to scaling high-impact entrepreneurship across the country and the African continent.
Joining the Endeavor South Africa (Endeavor SA) board in the past year are:
- Marang Denalane, co-founder and director of Sphere Holdings
- Tjaart van der Walt, co-founder of TymeBank
- Pieter de Villiers, co-founder and CEO of Clickatell.
In addition, Endeavor SA is delighted to announce that Barry Swartzberg, co-founder of Discovery, has assumed the role of chairperson in 2025. Barry brings not only deep strategic insight and a longstanding commitment to innovation and entrepreneurial growth in South Africa, but most importantly, he contributes ‘founder-DNA’.
“These appointments reflect Endeavor’s growing impact in South Africa’s scale-up ecosystem and our continued efforts to draw on diverse, experienced leadership to guide and amplify our work on championing high-growth entrepreneurship” says Alison Collier, MD, Endeavor South Africa.
Endeavor identifies and supports the most promising entrepreneurs who have the potential to scale beyond borders. With a network of high-growth, high-impact companies across fintech, enterprise tech, and disruptive sectors, Endeavor provides founders with tailored mentorship from over 165 active local and more than 5000 global mentors; access to capital and markets; and the global connections and support they need to accelerate their growth.
Endeavor is the world’s leading community for high-impact entrepreneurs. Established in 2004, Endeavor South Africa currently accelerates the scale-up of around 100 of the country’s most promising companies.
From 2021 to 2024, Endeavor SA entrepreneurs achieved over R8 billion in additional revenue and created more than 3,000 new jobs, 75% of which were for black South Africans, 80% youth, and 55% women. Portfolio companies include scale-up unicorns (companies valued at over $1 billion) such as Go1 and TymeBank, as well as Clickatell, Onafriq, Yoco, Carry1st, HelloPaisa, iiDENTIFii, Spark Schools, Sendmarc, Yellow, Yenza, Novita, Plentify and Flow.
Endeavor not only equips entrepreneurs to scale globally, but also reinvests in local ecosystems through its pay-it-forward model – via Endeavor SA’s Harvest Fund and the global Endeavor Catalyst Fund, where 100% of the carry is directed back into the ecosystem to fuel the next generation of disruptors and wealth creators.
Swartzberg says: “My role as Chairperson is clear: to champion Endeavor South Africa’s mission and support its team in enabling high-growth entrepreneurs to reach their full potential, empowering founders to build companies that create jobs, scale impact, and reshape industries.”
To view the full list of Endeavor South Africa board members, visit: https://southafrica.endeavor.org/community/board/
