British telecommunications giant BT has named former IBM sub-Saharan Africa GM Oliver Fortuin as its new MD following the resignation of Keith Matthews.

Fortuin, who was also a former GM of IBM’s PC Company in Africa, takes the top job at BT with immediate effect. Most recently, Fortuin, who has an MBA from Open University in the UK, was in charge of sales and business management for sub-Sharan Africa at i1 Solutions.

In April, Matthews announced he was stepping down as MD of BT in South Africa and GM of the firm’s sub-Saharan Africa region.

Matthews, who had been at the helm at the company for five years, told TechCentral that his decision to step down was driven by the “transformation requirements we have as a business”.

BT — formerly known as British Telecom — employs 170 people in sub-Saharan Africa, of which about 150 are based in South Africa. It provides IT and telecoms services to large companies in the region.

“The potential was always there to have someone running the business who was more representative of the transformed environment,” Matthews said at the time. “There was no pressure on me to step down for that reason; it was something I initiated in the company.”

He said it was important for BT, which already had 30% of its equity in black hands through shareholder Sekunjalo Holdings, to transform further, especially at management level. His decision to step aside and to make way for a new MD would open the door to new business opportunities, especially in the public sector, Matthews said.

Matthews, who had been with BT for more than eight years, took the leadership reins from Brian Armstrong, who left to take over as MD of Telkom Business. Armstrong was recently named as Telkom’s group chief operating officer. — (c) 2014 NewsCentral Media