The Team
Van Zyl Botha
Chairman+ Read BIO
Imel Rautenbach
Director+ Read BIO
Geniene Masher
Director+ Read BIO
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Van Zyl qualified as a Chartered Accountant (SA) in 2003. He created a financial consulting firm focused on private equity and the mining industry, consulting to companies listed in London, New York and private equity firms in Europe. Van Zyl joined the corporate world in 2006 and served on the board of a listed mining company as Financial Director at the age of 29.
Van Zyl moved from Johannesburg to Stellenbosch in 2012 where he was part of the team that founded HeroTel, where he currently serves as the Chief Executive Officer. Van Zyl architected and executed the company’s M&A strategy, which covered more than 30 strategic acquisitions, and was also responsible for raising capital and debt. Under his tenure as CEO Herotel has grown from 45 000 acquired customers across multiple brands to a strong base of 100 000 happy customers all serviced from a single brand.
Imel holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration as well as various formal Information Technology qualifications. He has over 20 years of software development experience, gained at an international level. After spending a decade working at various software development companies in Cape Town, he moved to the UK where he spent another decade as Head of IT at a large international software development company.
In 2006, Imel returned to South Africa and founded Cloud Connect, an Internet Service Provider, and Digital Village. After Herotel purchased Cloud Connect in 2015, Imel joined the team in Stellenbosch as National Head of Systems. He is still passionately involved in Digital Village.
Geniene was born and raised in Port Elizabeth where she has worked in the IT industry for over 10 years, gained experience in various IT related fields. She also worked at IGEN, an Eastern Cape-based WISP, when it was purchased by Herotel in 2017. Since that time, she has ascended to the position of Head of Sales & Marketing at Herotel Cloud on the Garden Route.
She is passionate about people and is looking forward to helping Digital Village fulfil its vision across South Africa.