SAP Africa has appointed Cathy Smith as Managing Director.
Smith has more than 25 years of leadership and technology experience and is the first female leader of SAP Africa.
“Africa is on the cusp of exponential growth and development enabled by digital technologies,” said Steve Tzikakis, Regional President for EMEA South at SAP.
“As one of the foremost experts in driving digital transformation on the continent, Cathy is imminently suited to leading our Africa operations. We have great confidence in her ability to realise our innovation vision across our customer base.”
Smith joins SAP from Cisco, where she was Managing Director for Sub-Saharan Africa, leading the development and execution of the company’s go-to-market sales and digital transformation strategies for the region.
Prior to that, she spent 23 years at IBM in a variety of leadership roles.
Smith says she is committed to developing the next generation of value-based African leaders, capable of guiding and leading their countries, as they balance the demands of globalisation with local visions of a sustainable society.
“Augmenting a culture of leadership, high performance and accountability, both internally and externally, is the core of Cathy’s mandate,” added Tzikakis.
“This appointment also reaffirms SAP’s commitment to empowering women in leadership and is in line with the company’s dedication to furthering South Africa’s employment equity and transformation agenda.”
Smith takes over from Claas Kuehnemann, who took on the role of acting Managing Director for SAP Africa over the past eight months and who now assumes a new leadership position with SAP in Switzerland. Claas will remain closely allied with SAP Africa as he will continue to be a non-executive director on the SAP South Africa Board.
