{"id":650328,"date":"2026-05-27T21:53:11","date_gmt":"2026-05-27T19:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/?p=650328"},"modified":"2026-05-27T21:59:22","modified_gmt":"2026-05-27T19:59:22","slug":"the-former-telkom-and-cell-c-ceo-who-is-now-a-director-at-a-bank-in-italy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/cellular\/650328-the-former-telkom-and-cell-c-ceo-who-is-now-a-director-at-a-bank-in-italy.html","title":{"rendered":"The former Telkom and Cell C CEO who is now a director at a bank in Italy"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Jeffrey Alan Hedberg, the former CEO of Cell C who later served as an acting group CEO at Telkom, is now a director at UniCredit in Milan, Italy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg has served on UniCredit’s board since May 2021, following a long career in telecommunications spanning Europe, Africa, and Asia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on 29 October 1961, Hedberg earned a Bachelor\u2019s degree in Business Administration, international business, and German from Northeastern University in 1985.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He began his career in corporate finance at TVM\/Matuschka Group in Munich that same year. In 1988, he moved to Boston and remained with TVM for another two years before joining US West in Denver.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the same time, Hedberg enrolled at the University of Denver to obtain his Master’s degree in business policy and law.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 1992, Hedberg moved to London, where he joined Coopers & Lybrand Consulting as a senior associate focused on the telecommunications industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Two years later, he moved to Swisscom in Bern, Switzerland, where he served as a director for the Unisource Alliance.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He rose through the ranks at Swisscom, becoming executive vice president in 1997 and a member of the board of directors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg left Swisscom at the end of 1998 to join Deutsche Telekom in Cologne, Germany, as an executive vice president. By 2002, he had become CEO, stepping down in 2004.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2006, Hedberg moved to South Africa after he was appointed CEO of Cell C, joining the mobile operator as it continued to struggle for traction against incumbents Vodacom and MTN.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of his most memorable moments at Cell C came during the company\u2019s financial results presentation in April 2008.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg said Cell C had a 3G-ready core network, but argued that \u201c3G is hype and we won’t fall prey to hype<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He was backed up by Cell C\u2019s chief financial officer at the time, Fabrizio Mambrini, who said 3G was becoming obsolete, with overseas operators already discussing 4G.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg said Cell C could not justify investing heavily in technology that did not offer a compelling return on investment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg said the company needed to evolve its data and broadband strategy, but would not spend billions merely to claim it had 3G.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This statement proved accurate in the much longer term, even if Hedberg was wrong about 3G being hype.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many years and three recapitalisations later, Cell C has outsourced the operation of its radio access network (RAN) to MTN. It also has a roaming agreement with Vodacom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Unable to spend billions of rands every year to compete with the incumbents on their cellular network quality, Cell C has adopted a capex-light model, buying wholesale access rather than building its own RAN.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

From Cell C to Telkom<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Hedberg left Cell C in November 2009 to head Multi-Links Nigeria for Telkom. \u201cI am proud of what has been achieved in Cell C during my tenure as CEO,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A few months later, Hedberg was appointed acting group CEO of Telkom after Reuben September stepped down from the role on 9 July 2010.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Frost & Sullivan ICT industry analyst Spiwe Chireka said at the time that the appointment was a good move for Telkom.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTelkom needs a turnaround strategy as a matter of extreme urgency, so to wait another 6 months before putting that plan into action would not have been beneficial to the company,\u201d Chireka stated.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt will be crucial that the Telkom board determines a suitable duration for the interim position, as turning the group around is not likely to be an overnight or one-year job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg left Telkom after it became clear that his appointment as Group CEO would not be made permanent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He joined Altech as chief operating officer on 1 July 2011, but left the South African technology sector in February 2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After a sabbatical as a private equity advisor, Hedberg joined Boston Group in Johannesburg in March 2013.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Returning to Europe<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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In July 2014, he joined Mobilink in Pakistan and became president and CEO in September of the same year. He served in that role until August 2016, before later becoming CEO of Wind Tre in Italy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Hedberg led Wind Tre from June 2017 until March 2022 and remained on the board until October 2022. He was also vice president of Italian telecommunications association Asstel from July 2017 to April 2022.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His move to UniCredit marked a shift from executive roles in telecommunications to banking governance at one of Italy\u2019s largest financial institutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In a lecture to Luiss Business School, Hedberg reflected on leadership and the importance of what he called \u201cleaving well\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This was shorthand for ensuring that there is a succession plan and that you leave an organisation in a better position than when you arrived.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cLesson one is when I leave, I want to leave well. Whether it\u2019s in sports or in business, you should ensure that you\u2019ve contributed to growth and not create an unfortunate dynamic when you leave.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lesson number two was to value the talent of the people in your team. \u201cThe more they shine, the more you will,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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More photos of Jeffrey Hedberg<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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Jeffrey Hedberg, the former CEO of Cell C who later served as an acting group CEO at Telkom, is now a director at the second-largest bank in Italy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":650333,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[7983,355,4736,109,105543],"class_list":["post-650328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cellular","tag-altron","tag-cell-c","tag-jeffrey-hedberg","tag-telkom","tag-unicredit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650328"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=650328"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650328\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":650342,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/650328\/revisions\/650342"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/650333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=650328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=650328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=650328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}