Brett van Aswegen is an experienced executive with more than 20 years involvement in the African retail credit and financial services industries. Brett joined Wonga as CEO in 2015 as part of a strategic turnaround of the business and led a management buyout of the company in 2019. During this time, Brett has led the company as CEO, where he has driven the transformation of Wonga from a traditional payday lender into a meaningful short-term lender, while transitioning out of the Wonga Group structure into an owner-managed business.
Among his career highlights, Brett led the automation of credit decisioning at the Lewis Group and was appointed to the board at 31. Brett further built AFB’s retail card operation in Kenya from inception and built a team of over 500 staff. Under his leadership, the division went on to issue more cards in the country than all retail banks combined.
Brett was admitted to the degree of Bachelor of Commerce majoring in Business Management and
Information Technology from the University of South Africa, and later achieved a Master of Business
Administration from the University of Cape Town. Brett’s vision is to create a purpose-led business that offers responsible and safe short-term financial products to customers that need to bridge small financial gaps.
