New Business Lead

The Role:

We think great new businesses are built the way great products are: by getting close to the customer, testing assumptions cheaply, and following the evidence rather than the plan.

Discover the opportunity: get deep with customers and agents in-market, frame the problem worth solving, and size the prize.

Own the model: define the commercial strategy and unit economics, and be accountable for whether the business is viable, not just whether it ships.

Build and lead: stand up operations and a local team, and grow both as the business scales.

Work across MOPO: partner with the Sheffield-based finance and technology teams and the China-based manufacturing teams to turn ideas into reality.

Report to the C-suite, help shape MOPO’s long-term strategy, and have the standing to make the call to scale, pivot or stop.

What Success Looks Like:

Because you’re building something new, we won’t set revenue targets before the opportunity is understood. We’ll judge success by the clarity of your thinking, the momentum you create, and the business you leave behind. Over your first 12–18 months, success looks like:

A validated business case. A clear, evidence-based view of the customer, the problem, the size of the prize and MOPO’s right to win is good enough for the C-suite to back with confidence.

A live pilot. Something real in at least one market, with actual customers and agents, generating hard data on unit economics and demand.

A funded path to scale. Either a repeatable model and a credible route to profitability, the business can scale across markets, or the honesty and evidence to recommend stopping or pivoting.

Real impact. Measurable progress on MOPO’s mission.

What We Are Looking For:

We’re flexible on years of experience and will tailor the role and reporting structure to your strengths. We care far more about how you think than your CV.

You’ll need

An analytical, structured, rigorous and well-reasoned approach to solving problems.

High attention to detail and a strong sense of personal agency and ownership.

Comfort with ambiguity and uncertainty, and the ability to generate forward momentum despite limited infrastructure and incomplete data.

A willingness to travel extensively and spend extended periods in African markets and openness to relocating if the business needs it.

A legitimate interest in frontier markets, energy access, e-mobility or social-impact ventures.

Bonus, but not essential: French (valuable in DRC and other markets); experience taking a venture, product or business line from zero to one; a background in emerging or frontier markets, energy, mobility, distribution or asset finance.