CHEMIN: The South African Chemical Incubator

Siphiwo joined Chemin on the 1st June 2010. His main responsibilities are to manage and coordinate all incubator activities associated with the Enterprise Development Programme, coordinate all marketing efforts of the incubator, provide general business support to incubatees especially on marketing and to seek new opportunities for growth and development for the incubator. Siphiwo first started working for Mercedes Benz in East London as a Dispatch Clerk before completing a Bachelor of Journalism and Media Studies at the University of Rhodes. Siphiwo also holds a Masters of Business Administration (MBA) degree from Newport University, USA, Advanced Executive Program from UNISA (School of Business Leadership) as well as Business Management (Executive Education) and Marketing Management (Training for Management) Diploma. He has worked for Radio CKI (now Tru FM) in Bhisho as a news reporter, sales representative and later promoted to Marketing and Communications Manager.

In 1993 he joined Eskom and in 2001 resigned at Eskom to form a consulting company, SSM Consulting. In 1996 he spent six months travelling in the USA and Europe, benchmarking first world best practices and looking at various processes of efficiency in the energy industry. He visited major power generating entities in the world, including National Power (UK), Niagara Mohawk Nuclear Station, Georgia Power and many others. He also had an opportunity to visit one of the top consulting firms in the world, McKinsey and the Boston Consulting Group. In 1997 he was awarded the Eskom's Special Chairman's award for turning around the Generation Division from a loss of R6 million to a profit of R6.08 million. In 2001 he joined Umthombo (PTY) Ltd, and in 2006 left to work for Continuum Outsource (PTY) Ltd in Pinetown as General Manager and rejoined Umthombo six months later as business development and consulting manager.

Siphiwo also received a life time award from the Eastern Cape Province for promoting the EC Province - this was a sequel to the annual Miss Radio CKI Beauty Pageant that he organized and promoted during the years he was the Senior Manager (communications and marketing). He brings to the Chemin Team a worth of expertise in management consulting, general management, operations management, marketing, communication and public relations.