Fernando Acafrao is the founder managing director of Mobile Satellite Technologies (MST), the market leader in the manufacturing and operation of specialised vehicle solutions in South Africa.

Originally from Angola, Fernando’s entrepreneurial drive is strong and he is acutely aware of the need to give back to others. His career started in the 1980s when he was focused on the IT industry for the most part of two decades. This, coupled with his background in computer coding and electrical studies, means he has a keen focus on the development of new technologies and utilising these to create the most affordable and effective way to reach rural and under-served communities with quality products and service. He is passionate about innovation and loves disrupting the status quo and these are two of MST’s strengths.  

Acafrao established MST in 2005 after learning the ropes of entrepreneurship in his two IT businesses and various other ventures. Since then, the company has grown to become market leaders in the field of specialised vehicles, providing healthcare, education and administrative services to underserved communities in several African countries.  

Says Acafrao: “The success of MST is like that saying: ‘It took me 50 years to get overnight success.’ I built two companies without any money and that created a base of an understanding of everything; of how to create something out of nothing. The circumstances I come from are quite unique and in a way that makes me blessed because I’ve always had to survive by making things happen. That’s one of the reasons why MST is a success. We’d never been in manufacturing when we first started doing this but if you don’t do the whole thing, you’re always at the mercy of the weakest link. You have to have the courage to be able to complete the full chain and that’s what we did, even though we didn’t have that background.”  

Acafrao has led MST to become the market leaders in mobile technology vehicle solutions and continues to identify new opportunities where MST can provide essential services to under-served communities in order to address certain social development needs in Africa. The latest, most exciting project is a full HIV solution. MST has designed and manufactured three vehicles according to spec that are in operation in Gauteng, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal, performing HIV tests and distributing ARVs. “The biggest problem we have with HIV is that everyone is doing their own thing in this fight. There are thousands of clinics but no connectivity between them. And skills are broad, you have one person who is treating HIV, Diabetes, Alzheimer’s and whatever. NGOs are getting millions of dollars to fight HIV but they have to rely on the physical clinic, the clinic has to rely on the courier company taking tests back to labs, the courier company has to rely on labs, and I don’t even want to speculate on national labs, the figures given to me of how many people are on ARVs that shouldn’t be because their results got mixed up are scary.”  

He continues and says the World Health Organisation (WHO) has said if the time between test and treatment can be shortened significantly HIV can be stopped by 2030. “So we asked, what can we do to help this happen? And we designed a solution. We’re going extreme. We do the blood test in the bus, the testing machines are there, the people with the qualifications, and the ARVs. We’ve taken a six-week process down to one day and eliminated many risk factors. We don’t mistake one person’s blood for someone else’s. We have a proper A-grade clinic in the vehicle and the whole solution is right there. From test to ARV distribution in three hours. What we’re building here is incredible.”  

Acafrao’s motto is to never assume that because someone says something is impossible, it is impossible and he has proven this belief time and again. With this current project the eradication of HIV, something that seemed impossible a few years ago, feels like it’s a lot more achievable and he won’t stop there. He closes and says: “There has been a complete change in behaviour as technology has developed and our reach has increased. This technology can help us get services everywhere and that’s what we aim to do.”