Managing Partner – Value Creation — Tower And Infrastructure Portfolio

The mandate

An advisory partnership has been asked to lead a value-creation programme for a tower and digital-infrastructure portfolio spanning diverse African markets. The assets have a credible tenancy base, but future growth assumptions rely increasingly on revenue beyond conventional mobile-network colocation. Enterprise connectivity, private networks, edge hosting, power services and fibre adjacency all appear attractive in isolation. In practice, each carries different customers, capabilities, regulation, capital intensity and service obligations.

The firm is appointing a Managing Partner – Value Creation to determine which adjacencies deserve investment and turn the answer into operating change. The partner will lead senior client relationships, frame the portfolio thesis, direct commercial and operational workstreams and remain accountable through early execution. They must protect the dependable economics of the existing tower base while challenging comfortable assumptions about lease-up, escalation, power recovery and site-level returns.

This urgent, unplanned mandate follows a board review that found ambition running ahead of evidence. The portfolio does not need another catalogue of possible growth markets. It needs a small number of investable moves, explicit choices about what not to pursue and an operating system that can learn from real customer adoption before committing capital at scale.

Scope and operating context

Based in Johannesburg under a hybrid arrangement, the role influences approximately 2,350 employees and material partners across South Africa and a wider international region. The client perimeter includes tower operations, sales, energy, fibre, property, finance, procurement, technology and country management. Delivery will draw on advisers in infrastructure, transactions, telecommunications, enterprise technology, data, organisation and implementation.

The tower estate ranges from dense urban rooftops to remote ground-based sites. Power availability, fibre reach, permitting, security, access roads and landlord arrangements differ substantially. A site suitable for another radio tenant may be unsuitable for edge equipment or an enterprise service that requires stronger physical control, response time and contractual assurance. Portfolio averages therefore provide a poor basis for adjacency investment.

Customer structures are also unfamiliar to parts of the organisation. Mobile operators buy through established master agreements and rollout teams. Enterprise, cloud or public-sector buyers may require solution design, channel coverage, shorter deployment cycles and different remedies. The value-creation plan must identify whether the portfolio should build, partner, acquire or merely enable these capabilities.

First-year agenda

The partner's first task will be to establish a site-and-contract economic baseline. The team will connect tenancy, amendment revenue, churn, escalation, power consumption, diesel or grid cost, maintenance, security, landlord terms, fibre availability and planned capital. A representative sample of sites will be physically reviewed to test the reliability of central records and expose constraints hidden inside aggregated returns.

Core tower performance will be separated from adjacency optimism. The partner will identify avoidable leakage in billing, power recovery, amendment capture, colocation cycle time, outage, rent and maintenance. Some of the highest-confidence value may come from executing the existing model better. These actions will be prioritised without allowing a short cost exercise to weaken uptime, compliance or tenant trust.

Each new growth thesis will then pass through a common investment screen. The review will define target customer, use case, addressable sites, required capability, route to market, service level, regulation, capital, working capital, unit economics and exit conditions. Enterprise connectivity may make sense only around certain fibre-connected clusters; energy services may be viable where metering and contractual allocation are robust; edge deployment may require an anchor customer before site hardening.

The Managing Partner will design market tests with genuine buying evidence. Rather than count expressions of interest, teams will seek priced commitments, pilot usage, conversion milestones and customer-funded elements. Pilots must include full operating cost and failure response. Results will determine whether to scale, redesign, partner or stop, and the board will see negative evidence rather than only successful stories.

Operating-model changes will follow the chosen moves. The portfolio may need a focused enterprise commercial cell, specialist solutioning, different contracting authority, stronger product ownership or partnerships for field response and cyber controls. Country teams must retain clear accountability. The partner will avoid building a large central function before the revenue mechanism is proven.

Capital allocation will be linked to stage gates. Site preparation, fibre extension, energy equipment and edge facilities will not be bundled into a broad strategic budget. Each release will depend on defined evidence, and sunk cost will not justify continuation. The programme will also test downside cases involving tenant consolidation, energy inflation, currency movement, permitting delay and lower utilisation.

By the end of twelve months, the client should have captured material leakage opportunities, launched a limited set of validated growth plays and created a site-level capital process capable of distinguishing option value from committed returns. The advisory team should be reducing, with capable client leaders owning the next decisions.

Leadership responsibilities

The Managing Partner will serve as the senior bridge between the portfolio board, management team, investors and advisory partnership. They will convert competing ambitions into explicit decisions, maintain a single value ledger and ensure financial claims reconcile with operational evidence. Where an investor horizon and management's infrastructure obligations create tension, the partner must present choices plainly rather than manufacture consensus.

They will appoint and direct multidisciplinary engagement leaders, review major analyses and spend time at operating sites and with prospective customers. The partner owns the integrity of the advice even when work is performed by specialists. They will intervene in scope growth, weak evidence or client dependency and leave behind decision capability rather than a permanent consulting layer.

The role also carries responsibility for engagement economics, risk, independence and information handling. Commercial pressure cannot alter technical diligence or the reporting of a failed pilot. Any relationship with vendors, funds, prospective buyers or customers will be disclosed and managed before advice is given.

Measures of success

The client board will track tenancy and amendment growth, colocation lead time, churn, contracted escalation, energy recovery, uptime, site contribution and capital productivity. Leakage actions will be measured through cash actually captured or cost durably removed, adjusted for service and risk consequences.

Adjacency measures will include qualified customer commitments, pilot conversion, recurring contribution, capital per live site, deployment interval and service performance. The value ledger will separate realised, contracted, forecast and option value. The advisory partnership will also review client satisfaction, implementation adoption, fee contribution, team development and the controlled transfer of methods to management.

Candidate profile

Candidates need at least 28 years of senior experience across tower companies, digital infrastructure, telecommunications, infrastructure investing or top-tier value-creation advisory. They must have shaped and implemented a portfolio thesis at site or asset level, not simply modelled one for a transaction. African operating exposure is important because power, access, currency and regulatory realities materially affect value.

The partner council will examine examples of improving core tenancy economics, testing a non-core growth hypothesis and stopping capital when demand evidence failed. Candidates should understand master service agreements, amendments, power systems, fibre, enterprise buying, capital allocation and the governance expectations of institutional owners.

The successful candidate will be sceptical without becoming inert. They must be able to move between a board valuation, a customer negotiation and the physical constraints of a tower compound. Their leadership should create productive tension between growth advocates and operating custodians while keeping both accountable to evidence.

Compensation and appointment terms

The expected base range is ZAR 9,800,000–14,000,000, plus annual incentive and long-term participation. Reward will reflect realised client value, quality of advice, implementation adoption, partnership contribution and talent development. Any co-investment or transaction-linked economics would require separate conflict review and formal approval.

Confidentiality

The client and advisory partnership remain unnamed because site economics, prospective adjacencies, investor expectations and supplier positions are sensitive. Detailed portfolio information will be released only after identity, independence and confidentiality checks. Applicants must not provide site lists, tenant agreements, power data or proprietary investment materials from another organisation.