The new man running DStv
David Mignot was recently announced as CEO of Canal+ Africa, which has assumed control over MultiChoice Group after clearing all regulatory conditions for its takeover.
The Frenchman is a seasoned media and telecoms executive and has notched significant achievements leading Canal+ in its predominantly Francophone African markets.
His new position comes with a major challenge off the bat: arrest MultiChoice’s subscriber exodus and bring back revenue growth amid increased competition from video streaming services.
Mignot was born in 1973 and raised in Mennecy, a small town in Essonne, a department in the southern part of the Île-de-France region.
In an interview with Podcast African Business Makers, he describes his hometown as being on the edge between a “quite unpleasant” suburb and the countryside.
While he said his childhood was happy thanks to great parents, he felt a bit disconnected from his classmates as he stood out for his height and academic achievements.
Mignot says he did not have any explicit dreams of future achievements but had a strong will to “live his own life” with some measure of control over what he could do with his time.
“The portion of humanity that has had a life they more or less controlled, where they could say ‘at least I had a degree of freedom’ or ‘for a significant part of my life, I could do what I want’ is tiny. It’s terrifying,” he said.
He explained that he and his two sisters grew up in an environment that exposed them to musical, literary, and theatrical culture, as well as the great outdoors.
“I come from a family of climbers, so every Sunday we were in the forest, every vacation we were on cliffs or in the mountains,” he said.
While they were relatively well-off, he was taught to respect that this was not a given and that hardships may not be far off.
With a father “literally” born under a helmet in Normandy during the World War II D-Day landings, and a mother growing up in a post-war Paris living on ration tickets, it was easy to assume this perspective.
Career history and guiding principles
Mignot considers it an immense privilege to have been born in France and to be a French citizen. “You realise it when you go on an expatriation assignment, when you travel all over the world,” he said.
He began forming a connection with Africa while in high school, where many African pupils attended class with him.
“After it was really a professional chance, quite frankly, that led me to become interested first in the Arab part of Africa, and then in the continental part,” he said
After completing what is effectively the equivalent of a BCom Economics Honours Degree at the Paris Dauphine University, he joined the military service.
In 1996, he was appointed to the consulting firm Bossard Consultants. His first job was helping TPS launch its own direct-to-home pay-TV platform to compete with Canal.
In 1999, he founded and led Internet and satellite television operator Parabole Réunion, where he remained until 2008.
Thereafter, he was appointed deputy CEO at Groupe Outremer Telecom, a French telecommunications provider operating in the country’s foreign territories.
In 2011, he was appointed as Canal+ director of African operations, and two years later, Canal+ Group general manager for Africa.
During his tenure, the company grew from 300 employees to around 2,000. Among his recent big focuses has been improving Canal+’s live sports coverage, a key strength of MultiChoice’s SuperSport.
He highlighted four cardinal values guiding decision-making in his personal life and professional career:
- Does a decision bring you closer — even with detours — to your personal or professional ambitions?
- Is there a form of courage involved in the decision? Is it not being made because you are comfortable rather than right?
- Is there integrity in the decision? Are you product of it and can you own it?
- Is there vertical and horizontal alignment between the various teams and ecosystem?
Furthermore, Mignot strongly believes that sharing bad practices across teams is just as important as sharing best practices.
While he has yet to detail his plans for MultiChoice, Mignot previously said he believes a pan-African strategy combining Canal+ and MultiChoice’s regional strengths could create a more formidable rival to other global streaming services.
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