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Helixx provides a "SWAT team" approach to addressing the dreams, fears and "living large" objectives of our clients. Following are selected Case Summaries relating to Helixx engagements presently in process. Additional Case Study documentation can be provided on request.

Isak Pretorius, President, Joint Aid Management USA & Founder/Chairman, LEOPARD Equity Fund for Africa

Born and raised in South Africa, Isak is intimately acquainted with the perennial problems that continue to plague the continent of Africa. The son of one of Africa’s great social entrepreneurs, Peter Pretorius, Isak has traveled to the remote corners of Africa’s communities and heartlands. These experiences have helped shape his passion to address the diverse needs of Africa’s children and communities which is at the heart of his life’s work.

The organization he now leads, Joint Aid Management (JAM-USA), now serves meals to an estimated 500,000 children in Africa each day. Isak is stewarding this platform by working to lead a new way of addresses challenges in Africa through the combination of social and economic development activities. Understanding the problems of poverty from the ground up, he has been able to make the difficult connection between compassion and capitalism. Not guided by a charity mentality, Isak is concerned rather with utilizing resources to connect the poor to world markets. The reality of a poverty-free future for Africa’s children depends on this connection being made in a serious and meaningful way. For 12 years he has worked to find the delicate balance between humanitarian relief and ‘thrivable’ development that comes from viable commercial enterprise.

Isak is writing a book entitled The Red Bowl, named for the now famous feeding bowls used by JAM across the continent. The Red Bowl draws from his experiences and outlines a “manifesto” for a new approach to development that will break the cycle of perpetual poverty in Africa (and elsewhere). He is also helping to develop and present key concepts in the transformation crusade – including “transitional finance,” the evolution of micro-finance that empowers agri-business to achieve commercial viability.

A business graduate from the University of South Africa, with a BComm in Business Management, Economics, Law and Accounting, Isak has engaged The Helixx Group to launch new branding and communications initiatives, and to help organize and fund a series of private equity ventures which demonstrate that “Africa is open for business.” He now splits his time between Africa and his home office in Washington, DC. He lives with his wife and daughter in Alexandria, Virginia.

09 September 2010