Derek Wilcocks has been an unobtrusive presence at the centre of South Africa’s IT scene for 25 years, first as a stalwart of the technology sector and now as Group CIO of Discovery. His career trajectory records not only his personal success, but also a profound shift in the role technology plays in business.

In the beginning, the action was all in the technology companies themselves. Wilcocks was in at the ground floor, having studied at Wits with the legendary group that founded Internet Solutions in 1993 (Ronnie Apteker, Philip Green, David Frankel and Tom McWalter). He joined IS in 1995, and held a variety of senior positions both at IS and Dimension Data, which acquired IS in 1997.