The Cell C boss sitting on a R224 million shareholding
JOHANNESBURG — Cell C CEO Jorge Mendes has built a shareholding worth more than R220 million at the mobile operator’s listing price, but only a fraction of those shares were bought with his own money, according to new details about an executive allocation made when Cell C listed on the JSE.
Mendes attracted attention in September when he spent R20.81 million of his own money buying 792,187 Cell C shares in two on-market transactions. He bought 52,187 shares at R23 each on 17 September and another 740,000 shares at R26.50 four days later, according to a JSE disclosure.
The purchases were initially significant because they appeared to represent a substantial personal investment by the executive leading Cell C’s recovery. Mendes later bought another 10,000 shares for about R238,669 on 22 September, according to a subsequent disclosure.
However, Cell C has now confirmed that Mendes already held a considerably larger block of shares that he did not personally fund.
TechCentral reported that Mendes received 7.65 million Cell C shares as part of a management structure implemented when the mobile operator listed on the JSE in November 2025. At the R26.50 listing price, that allocation was worth approximately R203 million.
Cell C told the publication that its executives did not fund the acquisition of those shares and that no company or shareholder loan was involved. The shares were transferred by The Prepaid Company, a subsidiary of Blu Label Unlimited Group and Cell C’s largest shareholder, as part of a 15.3 million-share management structure representing 4.5% of Cell C.
Mendes received half of that allocation.
Chief financial officer El Kope and chief of staff, strategy and business transformation Rachael Ayo-Oladejo each received 918,000 shares, valued at about R24 million apiece at the listing price. Cell C said the remaining approximately 5.8 million shares were allocated to prescribed officers who are not directors.
In total, the 15.3 million shares handed to executives were worth about R405 million at Cell C’s R26.50 listing price.
The allocations are subject to vesting restrictions and cannot immediately be sold. Cell C said 60% will vest over an average period of approximately 3.3 years, with the balance vesting over about 5.3 years. Until then, the shares are held in a broking account in Cell C Holdings’ name.
The disclosure provides additional context to Mendes’s decision to put more than R20 million of his own money into Cell C shares. His September purchases increased his overall holding to roughly 8.44 million shares, meaning the shares he personally purchased account for about 9% of his total holding.
The executive shareholding comes as Cell C attempts to establish a new chapter after years of financial difficulty and repeated restructuring.
For the year to the end of May, Cell C reported a 13.5% increase in revenue to R12.6 billion, while service revenue reached R11.1 billion. Headline earnings per share increased 57.4%, while Financial Mail reported that net debt fell from R5.7 billion to R2 billion and subscribers increased 17% to 8.9 million.
Mendes also received R29.3 million in remuneration for the year to 31 May, including a cash bonus of R11.96 million. TechCentral reported that the company’s short-term incentive scheme paid out despite Cell C recording controllable earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation of R2.11 billion against a R2.25 billion target.
The combination of the executive allocation and Mendes’s subsequent personal purchases leaves the Cell C chief with one of the most financially significant individual stakes among the operator’s executives, while tying a substantial portion of that wealth to whether Cell C can sustain its recovery as a listed company.
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