Obituary: Graham Mackay - CEO who turned SAB into world giant

1949-2013

GRAHAM Mackay, chairman and former CEO of SABMiller, died at the age of 64 on December 18. A giant of South African business, Mackay had a canny but modest leadership style that earned him international respect, awards and recognition.

Diagnosed with a brain tumour earlier this year, he stepped down as chief executive of the world's second-largest brewer and bottler to undergo surgery. He returned as executive chairman, but had to take leave of absence again in November for further treatment.

He married twice and had six sons.

Ernest Arthur Graham Mackay was born in Johannesburg on July 26 1949 and spent his childhood in Swaziland, Natal and Rhodesia. His father was a farmer who, having been shot down as a wartime pilot at El Alamein and held as a prisoner of war, afterwards "went off to find his soul in the African bush on plantations".

Mackay was educated at St Andrew's College, Grahamstown, after which he obtained engineering and commerce degrees from the universities of the Witwatersrand and South Africa.

Mackay joined South African Breweries as a systems manager in 1978, and the leadership potential he displayed enabled him to move through the ranks to become chief executive when SAB listed on the London Stock Exchange in 1999.

As CEO, he drove SAB's rapid expansion through acquisitions that would bring greater exposure to the developing world and new markets - notably in Africa and Latin America - with the windfall that followed its primary listing on the London Stock Exchange.

SAB's most notable acquisition under his directorship - that of Miller's in the US in 2002 - resulted in the new entity becoming a power player in the global beverage market. SABMiller is now active in 75 countries and the company is worth nearly R350-billion.

The kind of decision-making that turned SABMiller into a business behemoth and perennial investor favourite brought Mackay worldwide recognition as the CNBC business leader of the year for 2010, the Beverage Forum's 2010 lifetime achiever award, a top-20 ranking in the Harvard Business Review's 100 Best-performing CEOs in the World survey and business leader of the year in the Sunday Times Top 100 Companies awards.

In his private life, Mackay pursued a broad range of interests from playing squash and bridge to reading poetry, listening to classical music and studying particle physics and advanced mathematics. He was also fond of shooting when he found the time.

Friends and colleagues also noted his remarkable lack of ego and sartorial elegance.

In his 35 years with SAB, he made a lasting impression on young executives who would go on to be his peers in the South African business pantheon. Famous Brands CEO Kevin Hedderwick spent 11 years working under Mackay at SAB.

"Graham was the most visionary leader I have ever had the privilege of working for. He had the uncanny ability to not only extract the best out of his people, but to get them to stretch way beyond what they believed they were capable of. In my time with Graham, we would have followed him into battle any day. We trusted him implicitly."

Hedderwick said Mackay was an intellectual giant who constantly challenged his staff.

"Much of what I have achieved in my career outside of SABMiller is a tribute to Graham, who was unashamedly my role model. He was a thorough gentleman in every sense of the word and always humble. Beneath those tailored suits, though, was a genuine man's man - and he was not shy of a beer either!"

John Manser, who has taken over as chairman at SABMiller, said Mackay would have been the first to attribute success to a wider group of people, although he was the architect of the group's strategy and well supported by the chairman at that stage, Meyer Kahn.

"He had the vision, determination and the courage to do what he did. Success can never be attributed to one person, but he was the most important person. I think he had the courage to go where other people hadn't gone.

"The other major brewers were looking at the developed world and he was investigating the developing world, starting with Eastern Europe. South Africa has produced some very good business people, but he was exceptional," said Manser.

It is a view shared by Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan, who released a statement on the day of Mackay's death to express condolences to his family.

"Mackay was a phenomenal leader who took a South African giant and turned it into a multinational corporation that held its own in a very competitive industry," said Gordhan.

Julian Wentzel of Macquarie Securities said Mackay was undoubtedly South Africa's finest industrial export and a top-10 CEO globally.

"He built SAB into a global leader from a small, restricted capital base, showing his unbelievable vision. He was an incredible corporate chess player, plotting each move well ahead of the competition," said Wentzel.