Mark A Smith

Mark completed his articles and practised as an attorney for a few months before joining Shield Trading Corporation Ltd (“Shield”) as legal advisor. Mark was also the managing director of Infophone (Pty) Limited which operated telephony services in the premium rate service industry where he gained experience in the audiotex telephony platform. In 1991, Mark was appointed joint managing director of Shield. In 1992, Massmart Holdings (Pty) Ltd, a subsidiary of Wooltru Limited, acquired 66% of Shield and Mark was appointed the managing director of Shield. In May 1995, Mark was also appointed a director of Massmart Holdings (Pty) Ltd, the holding company of Shield, Makro and Dion. As managing director of Shield, Mark was responsible for 450 franchised outlets and responsible for sales of R1.3 billion. The total market share of Shield’s outlets totalled (collectively) approximately R6 billion. In February 1997, Mark phased out of Shield to start FoneWorx.

Mark has extensively researched Identity Verification applications and also attended courses on the subject matter. In addition, Mark has consulted widely with a number of legal professionals and industry bodies to acquire extensive knowledge in the area of Identity Verification.

Mark has also developed an extensive business training course orientated around the small, medium and micro enterprises and lectures on a broad range of topics in the Virtual Business Centre management courses in the Cognition Academy.

Mark has consulted widely with environmental experts on climate change and has also presented papers at various climate change conferences. In addition, Mark holds a number of workshops on climate change and restoration of local eco systems in line with climate mitigation and adaptation.