Chief Product Officer — Tower And Infrastructure Portfolio

The mandate

This tower and infrastructure portfolio allocates capital through country rollout requests, tenant forecasts, power upgrades, amendment programmes and strategic site development. The choices are technically informed but not consistently governed as products. Similar customer needs are solved differently by market; standard sites carry undocumented variation; build-to-suit projects can proceed before full lifecycle economics are visible. Capital is consequently tied up in inventory and configurations whose path to recurring revenue is uncertain.

The organisation is appointing a Chief Product Officer to create one accountable product system across the portfolio. The CPO will own product strategy, lifecycle, service definitions, investment requirements, pricing logic and adoption for colocation, build-to-suit, amendments, power and selected fibre-ready or adjacent infrastructure offers. Sales retains customer relationships, engineering retains design authority and operations retains site delivery. The CPO must connect them around repeatable, economically complete propositions.

This urgent replacement will inherit a live capital plan and cannot wait for an ideal catalogue. The first priority is to identify which investments serve contracted or highly credible demand, which preserve essential site capability and which are speculative options. The CPO must be willing to pause a rollout, redesign a standard or retire a local variant when evidence no longer supports it.

Scope and operating context

Based onsite in Johannesburg, the role influences approximately 2,175 employees and material partners across South Africa and a wider international region. The perimeter includes product management, portfolio planning, product operations, commercial analytics and launch governance, with deep interfaces into country sales, site acquisition, structural engineering, energy, fibre, operations, finance, technology, procurement and legal.

Site conditions vary widely. Land, permitting, access, security, grid reliability, renewable resource, backhaul and tenant equipment affect the feasible product. A standard must therefore specify controlled modules and boundaries, not assume identical physical delivery. Unmanaged localisation, however, makes spare parts, training, pricing and service assurance difficult.

Demand quality also differs. A signed anchor commitment is not equivalent to a non-binding rollout forecast; an amendment may yield rapid return but require structural or power capital; a strategic cluster may justify option investment only if its expiry and downside are explicit. The CPO will make those distinctions part of product and investment governance.

First-year agenda

The first ninety days will map the active product and capital portfolio. The CPO will connect each proposition and variant to live sites, pipeline, contracted revenue, required capital, deployment interval, operating cost, service performance and remaining obligations. Representative sites will be reviewed with country and engineering teams so written standards are tested against physical conditions.

A product architecture will define the core modules: space and loading, power configuration, access, monitoring, security, backhaul readiness, amendment and ancillary service. Country parameters will capture legitimate differences in regulation, climate, currency and supply. Deviations will require an owner, economic case and lifecycle plan rather than being embedded in project correspondence.

Build-to-suit will receive a clearer stage-gate. Opportunity qualification must state tenant commitment, search area, planning likelihood, land position, power path, expected colocations, capital, delivery risk and exit. Early development funding may preserve a valuable option, but full release will depend on stronger evidence. Projects that miss conditions will be redesigned, transferred or stopped before sunk cost dictates continuation.

Existing-site investment will compete through the same product logic. Structural strengthening, rectifiers, batteries, generators, renewable systems, cooling, access and fibre readiness will be linked to customer orders, risk reduction or measurable operating value. Teams will not label every upgrade as strategic. Where several tenant needs can be combined into one standard intervention, the CPO will create a repeatable package and price.

Power products require particular discipline. Service definitions must separate energy provision, backup, metering, pass-through and availability. Price and contract models will reflect local energy cost, losses, maintenance and capital. Investments in solar, storage or efficiency will be evaluated at site cohort level, including reliability and replacement, rather than through headline fuel savings.

The CPO will introduce lifecycle ownership after launch. Product managers will review order conversion, delivery, capital variance, service, margin, exceptions and customer feedback. A proposition that creates recurring field work or contractual dispute will be corrected even if initial bookings are strong. End-of-life standards will address installed assets, tenant consent, spares and commercial transition.

Product tools and data will be rationalised around decisions. Sales should see availability and eligibility; engineers should receive complete requirements; finance should trace capital to product and contracted outcome. The CPO will sponsor the information model but avoid a large technology programme before owners and standards are clear.

Within twelve months, the portfolio should have fewer unmanaged variants, a better-qualified capital queue, faster repeatable delivery and visible product economics. At least one speculative programme should have been stopped or reframed, demonstrating that product governance changes allocation rather than only documentation.

Leadership responsibilities

The CPO will chair product and lifecycle governance and bring recommendations to the group sponsor and capital committee. They will own the commercial-operational integrity of propositions while respecting formal safety, engineering and country authority. When a global standard conflicts with local reality, the executive must find a governed module or conclude that the product should not be offered there.

They will lead product managers who can interpret site and contract detail, not merely write road maps. Country teams must regard the function as a source of faster decisions and reusable solutions, while accepting that exceptions require evidence. The CPO will establish clear career paths and rotate talent through field and customer contexts.

Customer dialogue will remain part of the role. The CPO will engage tenant technology and rollout leaders to understand future equipment, power and deployment needs without treating every forecast as commitment. Supplier road maps will be tested against portfolio needs, interoperability and exit.

Measures of success

The executive committee will monitor contracted demand covered by product standards, order-to-ready interval, capital per live service, delivery variance, site and power availability, amendment conversion and recurring contribution. Pipeline will be weighted by evidence and compared with committed capital.

Lifecycle measures include variant count, exception age, product-related incidents, field interventions, disputes, adoption and retirement progress. Capital stopped, avoided or redirected will be reported alongside projects completed. Leadership measures include country adoption, decision speed and product-management capability.

Candidate profile

Candidates should bring 22–28 years in towers, energy infrastructure, fibre, telecommunications products or another capital-intensive B2B platform. They must have owned product economics and physical delivery across multiple markets. Experience governing build-to-suit and installed-base investment is especially relevant.

The board will seek evidence of refusing weak forecast-led capital, modularising legitimate market variation and correcting a product whose operating burden emerged after sale. Candidates should understand site development, structural and power constraints, tenancy agreements, lifecycle cost, pricing and investment gates.

The successful CPO will be technically curious, commercially rigorous and comfortable at an operating site. They must arbitrate between global reuse and local feasibility, challenge senior sales forecasts and simplify without erasing risk. Clear written product judgement is essential.

Compensation and appointment terms

The expected base range is ZAR 6,800,000–9,200,000, plus annual incentive and long-term participation. Reward will balance product contribution, capital productivity, service performance, simplification and leadership depth. Final terms will reflect comparable asset responsibility, cross-border experience and verified forfeited awards.

Confidentiality

The portfolio remains unnamed because tenant forecasts, site locations, capital plans and product economics are sensitive. Detailed records will follow identity, conflict and confidentiality review. Applicants must not submit site files, tenant agreements, engineering standards or supplier pricing from another organisation.