Isabel dos Santos (born 20 April 1973) is an Angolan businesswoman, Africa’s richest woman and the eldest child of Angola’s former President Jose Edurado Santos, who ruled the country from 1979 to 2017. In 2013, according to Forbes, her net worth had exceeded US $2 billion making her Africa’s first female US dollar billionaire. Forbes described how Isabel dos Santos acquired her wealth by taking stakes in companies doing business in Angola, suggesting that her wealth comes almost entirely from her family’s power and connections. In November 2015, the BBC named Isabel dos Santos as one of the 100 most influential women in the world.
HOLDINGS
- Trans Africa Investment Services, a Gibraltar based vehicle founded together with her mother for the diamond business
- Unitel International Holdings B.V.: change of name of Kento and Jadeium, based in Amsterdam, company-vehicle for dos Santos’ investment in telecommunications
- Santoro Finance: company-vehicle for dos Santos’ investment in Banco BPI based in Lisbon
- Esperaza Holding B.V.: based in Amsterdam energy, oil etc.
- Condis: a retail business based in Luanda
5 Isabel dos Santos Quotes
If you are hard-working and determined, you will make and that’s the bottom lines. I don’t believe in an easy way though.
I’ve had business sense since i was very young. I sold chicken eggs when i was six.
If you do something that’s going to get somebody a job, then they’ll be able to pay their kids school school fee, and then the kid is going to be a doctor and then that doctor is going to probably help who knows how many other people, so its very motivating. Much more fun than going to the beach.
Creating opportunities and employment for women means betting on the progress of the communities themselves. When they thrive, women invest their income in the family, health and education. I value this as a sense of duty, commitment and dedication. The impact that women create around them is powerful and transformative.
