With a towering reputation of great feats, Ahmad Farroukh, the newly appointed Globacom Chief Executive Officer is fondly called “Boss of the Bosses”. He earned the sobriquet “Boss of the Bosses” for his evident competence and virile leadership through which he groomed a coterie of young talents into outstanding corporate leaders who are currently holding sway in different top-notch companies.
Now at Globacom, he will have to work with Dr. Mike Adenuga, the inimitable Chairman of Globacom. Farroukh was till recently the Group Chief Executive Officer, Smile Telecoms Holdings Ltd with footprints in Nigeria, Uganda, Congo DR and South Africa. He holds an MBA majoring in Administration and Accounting and is also a Certified Public Accountant. Farroukh studied and worked in the Middle East, Europe and North America and has spent over 21 years in the telecoms industry in emerging markets.
Farroukh, renowned for his illustrious career within the MTN Group for 9 years, served as the CEO of both MTN Nigeria, MTN South Africa and as Group Chief Operating Executive; managing 19 Operations, achieving remarkable milestones in growth and profitability, including the unprecedented growth of MTN Nigeria’s subscriber base from nine to forty million during his tenure. He was also the GCOE of MTN Group, superintending over 19 operations, the bulk of which, thanks to his instrumentality, were profitable.
Prior to MTN, Farroukh had led the West African region of Scancom Limited (Investcom Holding Group) which was valued at USD3 billion in 2006 when the company was acquired by MTN Group. After buying Investcom, MTN set a price for it at USD 2.8 Billion or 51% out of the total price of USD 5.5 Billion for the entire 11 Operations they bought. The performance of Ghana was outstanding and more than 65% market share and EBITA of above 65%. All the 19 Operations at MTN of which he was the Group Chief Operating Executive were self-funded and profitable with the exception of South Sudan.
But it was MTN that he earned the sobriquet “Boss of the Bosses” for his unmatched record of nurturing young talents into great corporate leaders of today. A role call of such talents include the current CEO of MTN Nigeria Karl Toriola was the CTO of MTN Nigeria when Farroukh was CEO of MTN Nigeria. He kept supporting Karl until he took his first senior managerial post at CEO of MTN Cameroon.
The current COO of MTN Nigeria, Hassan Jaber worked directly as his ICT Head in MTN Ghana at his early career stages in 2000 when Farroukh was CEO and thereafter Hassan was supported to be CEO of MTN Conakry, Sudan, Afghanistan Mazen Mroue the current Group Technical executive started his career in IT in Ghana under Farroukh and was to become time CEO of Liberia, and later Uganda. Ebenezer Asante was given his first top post in Rwanda when Farroukh was GCOE. Also, the current CEO of MTN fintech Serigne Dioum was placed to drive Mobile Money in Ghana by Farroukh and executed the most successful Mobile Money achievement in Ghana. Not less than five current MTN Group Exco member were talent discovered, sponsored and encouraged by Farroukh, the “Boss of the Bosses”
