JSE-listed Allied Technologies (Altech) has appointed systems engineer Willie Oosthuysen as CTO.
Oosthuysen, who started at Altech at the beginning of this month, takes over from Ashraff Paruk, who left the company at the end of December.
Oosthuysen was previously director of systems engineering of Cisco's emerging central unit, which covers the Middle East and Africa. He has held various senior management roles within Cisco over the past 12 years, and spent the past five years on international assignments, working from Paris, France.
While at Cisco, Oosthuysen was awarded the Europe, Middle East and Africa Systems Engineering Manager of the Year award, in San Francisco, in 2005; and the Emerging Markets Systems Engineering Director of the Year award, in Las Vegas, the following year.
Before joining Cisco, Oosthuysen spent eight years working for Sasol in various technical and management roles.
Oosthuysen, who has more than 20 years of technology experience, will report directly to Altech CEO Craig Venter. He will have overall responsibility for the long-range direction of technological planning, development and delivery within the group, says Altech in a statement.
Technological expertise
The company says Oosthuysen “will define Altech's technology vision and direction in order to improve its competitive performance in the telecommunications, multimedia and IT sectors”.
data communications, an MSc in computer science as well as a PhD in computer science from the University of the Free State. He also has a MBA from the MIT Business School Faculty in the US.
Venter is confident Oosthuysen's “extensive systems engineering experience” and his ability to align technology to business strategy, as well as his “expertise in managing technology” will be invaluable.
Oosthuysen's skills and experience match Altech's key technology objectives of encouraging technological innovation with a view to leveraging ownership of intellectual property and capitalising on the convergence structure of the Altech Group, says Venter.
“Willie [Oosthuysen] has successfully implemented far-reaching technological and business change in the companies he has worked for and he has the expertise to take emerging technology trends and translate them into real value for businesses,” he adds.
“Altech is one of the leading ICT companies in SA and this is a great opportunity to become a part of its leadership team as the company extends its global reach and influence,” says Oosthuysen.
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