Growing up, the Riverlea born Mitchan Adams’s dream was to become a rapper. His parents did not want him to give up his dream but they made him promise that he would also get a qualification and a stable job. They knew how hard it is to start from nothing, both of them having to leave school and start working to help out with their families. Being a good son, he did as they asked, a decision that would result in him starting a financial technology company that would go on to be worth an estimated R15 billion.
Mitcham registered for a Diploma in Computer Software Engineering at the University of Johannesburg, graduated three years later and became a Software developer for a Stockbroking firm. He then became a Senior Software Engineer at a Payments Gateway company, where, for the next 7 years, he worked his way to a manager position. He had done what his parents asked of him, got the qualification and a stable job but never gave up the dream.
During all this time, he bought himself music equipment, made music and even started a company called, Scratch Beats Entertainment. Through this company, he began writing songs for and managing other artists, even releasing a few songs on the radio. It was here that he developed a taste for entrepreneurship and he wasn’t too bad at it. In fact, he was pretty good at it and wanted more.
Brainstorming with his childhood best friend and neighbour, Lyle Eckstein, they came up with an idea to sell software to small businesses to improve the way they do things. Their experience made them realise that small businesses have difficulty with payments and since Mitcham worked with payment systems, they decided to develop an app that made getting paid easier. This idea became a company called i-Pay, founded in 2014, and that company eventually became the R15 billion Ozow. But it wasn’t that easy.
For the next couple of years, they had to get funding, clients and employees, a task that almost bankrupted them. At one point, they had struggled with getting money for groceries but they persevered and in 2016, investors decided to give them R10 million to grow their business. By 2021, it was revealed that clients used Ozow to make and receive R1.5 billion in payments, which convinced even more investors to give them another R746 million.
Today, Ozow is one of South Africa’s largest online payments companies with 6 million clients, employing more than 150 people and billions of rands of rands flowing through their company. Mitchan isn’t done yet, however.
In 2022, he founded an investment company that has thus far, invested R30 million in small businesses, with another R100 million on its way. Also, in a way, he has not given up the dream. In addition to sitting on the boards of 2 other companies, he also sits on the board of Music Business Lab, a company that focuses on developing professionals and businesses within the music industry.
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