{"id":866466,"date":"2026-07-16T10:12:51","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T08:12:51","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=866466"},"modified":"2026-07-16T10:12:54","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T08:12:54","slug":"top-ceo-quietly-becomes-a-billionaire-in-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wealth\/866466\/top-ceo-quietly-becomes-a-billionaire-in-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Top CEO quietly becomes a billionaire in South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Chief executive and founder of Karooooo, Zak Calisto, has quietly crossed the threshold into dollar-billionaire status once again, with his holdings in the group now worth $1.05 billion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of the last reporting, Calisto is the largest shareholder in the company, directly owning 58% of the group\u2019s shares.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He previously owned 64% of the shares, but sold 1,500,000 Ordinary Shares when Karooooo facilitated and launched an SEC-registered underwritten secondary public offering in June 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This resulted in a R1.3 billion sale<\/a> for Calisto, but also reduced his direct shareholding to 58%, and, at the time, pulled that value below the $1 billion mark.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, on Thursday (16 July), the Karooooo carried\u00a0a market capitalisation of $1.81 billion<\/strong>, putting Calisto\u2019s direct stake at over $1 billion once again, even with the reduced holding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Given the nature of market cap fluctuations, this is subject to change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite this, beyond his direct holdings, he also has access to an additional 10% of the company under a standing agreement. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, this gives him beneficial voting rights rather than a direct financial benefit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Karooooo, formerly known as Cartrack, is a global provider of fleet management, stolen-vehicle recovery, and insurance telematics services. The company was founded in 2001 and listed on the JSE in 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The group has experienced exponential growth over the years, growing from vehicle tracking to fleet management and various mobility software-as-a-service (SaaS) platforms for connected vehicles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its global expansion has also been extensive. Starting in South Africa, it quickly moved into the rest of Africa, then Europe, Asia and the Americas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company is now headquartered in Singapore and operates in 24 countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In its latest reporting, Karooo reported revenue rising 22% to R1,564 million for the first quarter of FY27, which ended in May, while subscription revenue increased 19% to R1,354 million.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cartrack\u2019s revenue increased by 20% to R1,387 million, driven mainly by its subscription-based business model.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cartrack\u2019s subscription revenue also jumped by 19% to a record R1,351 million (Q1 2026: R1,138 million), driven by the acquisition of new customers and the sale of Video and Cartrack-Tag to customers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Calisto’s direct holding in the company now makes him one of only ten dollar billionaires in South Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Along with other frequent faces on the list, he joins two other relative newcomers, including Dis-Chem’s Ivan Saltzman and family<\/a>, and Le Creuset’s Paul van Zuydam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

South Africa’s dollar billionaires<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
#<\/strong><\/td>Billionaire<\/strong><\/td>2026 Wealth<\/strong><\/td><\/tr>
1<\/td>Johann Rupert<\/td>$18.1 billion<\/td><\/tr>
2<\/td>Nicky Oppenheimer<\/td>$10.6 billion<\/td><\/tr>
3<\/td>Michiel Le Roux<\/td>$3.7 billion<\/td><\/tr>
4<\/td>Patrice Motsepe<\/td>$3.6 billion<\/td><\/tr>
5<\/td>Koos Bekker<\/td>$3.5 billion<\/td><\/tr>
6<\/td>Jannie Mouton<\/td>$2.7 billion<\/td><\/tr>
7<\/td>Christo Wiese<\/td>$1.8 billion<\/td><\/tr>
8<\/td>Paul van Zuydam<\/td>$1.7 billion<\/td><\/tr>
9<\/td>Ivan Saltzman<\/td>$1.3 billion*<\/td><\/tr>
10<\/em><\/td>Zak Calisto<\/em><\/td>$1.0 billion**<\/em><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div>
Source: Forbes Real-Time Index, *Bloomberg Billionaire Index, **BusinessTech<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Chief executive and founder of Karooooo, Zak Calisto, has quietly crossed the threshold into dollar-billionaire status once again, with his holdings in the group now worth $1.05 billion.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":806902,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2077667811103523091","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9880],"tags":[22558,22633],"class_list":["post-866466","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wealth","tag-karooooo","tag-zac-calisto"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866466","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=866466"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866466\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":866470,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866466\/revisions\/866470"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/806902"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=866466"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=866466"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=866466"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}