This archive report was first published on 4 November 2019.
DT Dobie executive chairman Zarak Khan is leaving the company after nearly four decades of service. He will depart in March 2020, having served the company since 1981.
Mr Khan, now 60, joined DT Dobie as a management trainee and rose through the ranks to become CEO in 1997. He served as chief executive for 20 years until 2017, when he was appointed chairman.
Under his leadership, DT Dobie expanded its presence in Kenya's automobile industry and shifted its focus to heavy commercial vehicles. The company is the authorised dealer of Mercedes Benz, VW, Hyundai, and GMW pick-ups.
“After close to four decades with the company, I believe it is my time to focus on other adventures,” Mr Zarak said in an interview with Business Daily in 2019.
His exit comes two years after Japanese conglomerate Toyota Tsusho took full control of DT Dobie for Ksh5.4 billion in 2018. Toyota had acquired a 97.81% stake in French firm CFAO, which fully owns Kenya's DT Dobie, in 2012 for Ksh265.4 billion.
DT Dobie's takeover by Toyota led to the loss of the Nissan franchise, which the company had held for 50 years. Mr Khan described the loss as his lowest moment.
However, the company weathered the crisis by taking up the Germany's Volkswagen (VW) brand after rival CMC Holdings lost the franchise.
Mr Khan's life at DT Dobie has been an interesting one, rising from a cleaner-cum-tea boy to the executive suite. He was born and brought up in a poor neighbourhood in the coastal town of Mombasa.
When his father passed away when he was 11 years old, his uncles paid his school fee through their small businesses.
He attributes DT Dobie's success to focus on customer demands and preferences. “We have been able to achieve through the assembly of reliable vans, pickups, small SUVs, and trucks, which allow people to move around the country,” he says.
So has he achieved his goal at DT Dobie? “I have steered the company's growth and takeovers, and I believe I have transformed it to a household name in Kenya,” Mr Khan said.
