Peter Ndegwa, the man who scaled up the operations of East African Breweries (EABL) as the Chief of Finance has now taken over the helm of Safaricom as the Chief Executive Officer.
His long-awaited assumption into office comes exactly eight months after the position was rendered vacant following the death of Bob Collymore on July 2019.
He takes over from Safaricom’s founder Michael Joseph who has been acting in an interim capacity after Collymore succumbed to cancer.
Ndegwa joins Safaricom from Diageo PLC, where he has been serving as the Managing Director of Diageo Continental Europe. He has also been overseeing the operations of Diageo PLC in 50 countries in Western and Eastern Europe, Russia, Middle East and North Africa region.
He had previously served for seven years as CEO in Guinness Nigeria PLC and Guinness Ghana Breweries PLC, where he transformed the two operations to deliver a double digit growth by investing in people, introducing new brands and reorganising the businesses.
He is credited with the development of an affordable-beer strategy for EABL resulting in the production of new brands such as Senator Beer. Senator Beer became one of the most successful innovations by Diageo that has been featured in the Harvard Business Review. He started his career at PwC, the global consulting firm, where he worked for 11 years.
The 51-year-old Ndegwa takes over the helm of East Africa’s giant telco at such a time when businesses across the globe have been hard hit by coronavirus pandemic, which has shaken the global economies.
