Alton Solomons

Chief Executive Officer

Alton is a qualified Chartered Accountant with a post graduate diploma in Auditing from Unisa. He qualified as a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) in June 2007, with the CFA Institute in the USA. In 2003 Alton successfully completed the Lim’uvune Investment Training and Development Programme.

 

He completed his articles with PricewaterhouseCoopers in 2001 where he gained audit and accounting exposure in various industries. He then joined Shoprite Checkers as a Trainee Divisional Financial Manager responsible for reporting on a number of African Countries. In March 2002 he joined the Industrial Development Corporation as a Business Analyst, later to be promoted to Account Manager. Here he gained valuable experience with clients in the IT, telecoms and electronics industry. His duties included deal sourcing and structuring, due diligence investigations and post investment management.

 

Alton joined SPE in May 2005 as an Investment Principal and was promoted to Partner in January 2008. His responsibilities include the leading of, and assistance in, transactions from identification, initiation, negotiations, closing, monitoring investments and exit thereof. He also represents SPE and its clients on boards and investment committees of portfolio companies and private equity funds.

 

Raymond Simao

Investment Principal

Raymond began his professional career by completing his accounting articles at Ernst & Young’s head office in Johannesburg, where he gained exposure to a range of industries from manufacturing, electronics, printing, freight & forwarding to the finance sector which included banking and brokerage houses.

He subsequently joined the finance risk management team of Nedcor’s corporate banking division. After five and a half years at Nedcor, Raymond joined the then Gensec Bank to establish the risk management division for fixed income debt instruments, of its subsidiary asset management business, now Sanlam Investment Management.

After establishing the risk management operation, Raymond moved into a debt structuring role, in order to leverage the opportunities inherent in the market. Most recently, Raymond was appointed to the Sanlam Private Equity team as an investment principal, representing a natural progression of his skills development in deals transacted in the empowerment space.  

Rene Schutte

Investment Principal

Rene is a qualified Chartered Accountant and completed her articles at  PricewaterhouseCoopers in the Entrepreneurial Advisory Division.  She also holds a Masters Degree in South African and International Taxation from RAU.

 

Rene has been active in the private equity industry since 2004 when she joined Tiso Group as Finance Manager and Private Equity Deal Executive.  At Tiso, apart from being responsible for the entire finance function, she was also responsible for the evaluation and structuring of investments, providing tax advice to the group and representing the Tiso Group on the audit committees of its various investments.

In 2008 she joined Tsiya Group, a small investment company, as Director, responsible for deal sourcing and structuring, due diligence investigations and post investment management.  During her time at Tsiya, she was seconded to a radio station in KZN (Gagasi 99.5) as Managing Director.

 

Rene joined Sanlam Private Equity in March 2011 as Investment Principal, where she is responsible for sourcing potential investments, evaluation and implementation and post investment management.  She also represents SPE on the various governance structures of its investments.

 

Lusanda Dube

Investment Associate

Lusanda is a qualified Chartered Accountant, and served her articles with PricewaterhouseCoopers in Cape Town, after completing her BCom degree and Post-Graduate Diploma in Accounting, both from the University of Cape Town.

 

Lusanda joined the Sanlam Group in February 2004 and gained experience in various roles - from Financial Systems Analysis, to Debt Investment Management and Credit Risk Analysis, before joining the Sanlam Private Equity team as an Investment Associate in January 2007. 

 

Lusanda is responsible for the evaluation of prospective investments and the implementation thereof.  She also manages existing investments and represents Sanlam on various governance structures of these investment entities.

 

Brett Mallen

Investment Associate

Having graduated from the University of Cape Town with a B.Com and LL.B, Brett completed his articles with Brink Cohen le Roux & Roodt Inc and was admitted as an attorney in March 2002. 

 

Brett joined the Sanlam Investments cluster as a Legal Advisor in June 2004 upon returning to South Africa, once he had completed his Masters in International Business Law (cum laude) at Leiden University.  During his employment as a Legal Advisor, Brett completed the Sanlam Senior Management Development Programme and passed all 3 levels of the CFA exams.  He also worked closely with Sanlam Private Equity during this time, negotiating and structuring the private equity transactions and contributing towards formulating the SPE business strategy.

 

In September 2009, Brett joined the Sanlam Private Equity team as an Investment Associate, where he now sources and analyses prospective investments, negotiates and implements private equity transactions and manages certain of the investments in our current portfolio.

 

Diane Pitt

Financial Manager

Diane is a qualified Chartered Accountant and served her articles with PricewaterhouseCoopers in Cape Town, after obtaining her Post Graduate Diploma in Accounting and Bachelor of Business Science (with Honors in Finance) degree from the University of Cape Town.  She is a member of the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA).

 

Prior to joining SPE, Diane worked in the management accounting team at Schroders Asset Management in London and as a Financial Controller at Mvelaserve in Cape Town.

 

Diane Pitt joined Sanlam Private Equity as Finance Manager on 1 December 2008 and is responsible for all finance duties for SPE, including client reporting and portfolio management.

 

Jerome Davies

Operations Manager

Jerome is a qualified Chartered Accountant and served his articles with KPMG in Cape Town. He holds a B.Com - Accounting/Economics degree from the University of Cape Town and a B.Com (Hons) - Accounting degree from the University of Natal.

 

During his articles Jerome was seconded as Audit Senior to the KPMG Africa Department of Professional Practice based in Johannesburg, and to KPMG in Philadelphia on a 3 month rotational basis. Post articles Jerome remained at KPMG as an Audit Manager in the Financial Services division and later as a Corporate Finance manager in the Corporate Finance division.

 

Jerome joined Sanlam Private Equity as Operations Manager in February 2009 and is responsible for all operational duties at SPE. 

 

Lerdean Maggott

Administration Officer

Lerdean joined Sanlam Investment Management in 1997.  She started her career at SIM in the Equity Research department and moved to Sanlam Private Equity in 1998.  She has been and continues to be the back-bone of the SPE support system.

 

Maxinne Mnyaka

Personal Assistant 

Maxinne joined Sanlam Private Equity in 2008.  She is a qualified Executive Assistant with 3 years experience in the Financial Services Sector. She manages the administration in the Johannesburg office.