When Cobus Grove joined Digicore two years ago the company’s share price was a measly 125. After an impressive reorganisation that share price was 325 last December. The success of Grove and temporarily returned founder and CEO Nick Vlok didn’t go unnoticed. Last month, just after Grove was presented the Compliance and Governance Award at this year’s CFO Awards, Nasdaq-listed Novatel Wireless made an offer over R1 billlon on the company – and the share price shot up to 410.
- This article is part of a series of profiles of 2015 CFO Award winners. Previously, we portrayed CFO of the Year Deon Viljoen (Alexander Forbes), double-award winners Anoj Singh (Transnet) and Brett Tromp (Discovery Health) and Finance Transformation Award winner Bongani Nqwababa (Sasol).
With the amazing turnaround, Grove, still only 32 years old, has proven that he is not only one of the country's most impressive compliance experts, he is also one of our most promising CFOs and business leaders. This is from the CFO Awards program booklet:
By far the youngest nominated CFO this year, Cobus Grove has an impressive track record as IFRS specialist and lecturer. He needed all of his acumen to help save Digicore from an inglorious demise, restating accounts dating back 14 years. Grove also convinced major client Discovery to start paying upfront (again) for in-vehicle boxes, closed a factory, fired the country CFO for South Africa, introduced monthly reconciliations, eliminated bad stock, changed the debtors process and changed the remuneration structure. "I have the ability to understand the business and I have the technical accounting ability," he explains, adding that he also builds relationships easily.
It was Mervyn King, doyen of corporate governance, who handed out the award to Grove."It is about performance and not conformance," he said. "The application of quality governance does pay dividends," he added about the winner of the Award.
- Digicore's CFO Cobus Grove was one of the winners at the CFO Awards 2015. Next year's CFO Awards will take place on 12 May 2016, once again at the Summer Place in Johannesburg. If you would like to buy a table, join the panel of judges or become a partner you can email Jurrien Morsch. Attendance is free for members. Visit CFOawards.co.za.
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