History

MXA was established as a partnership in 1995. It was comprised of two partners (Thokozani Xaba and Alastair McIntosh) together with six or seven associates. The partnership largely responded to South African tenders within the public sector consulting arena. Between 1995 and 2001 the company grew both in respect to the number of people that associated with it and also in terms of its areas of competencies. These ranged from local government support, land and environmental management, planning, development management, M&E and many others.

In 2001 the partnership was dissolved in favour of a limited company. This was to enable a broadening of the composition of the company shareholders and to accommodate the growth or the company. When the limited company was established additional shareholders and directors were brought on board, including Kgomotso Mathews and Zini Godden.

Two developments marked the beginnings of the period since the limited company was established.

First, MXA found itself responding to donor opportunities in the sub-region, particularly European Framework Contracts led by the EU through the framework partners. MXA has gained a reputation for accessing high quality experts in the sub-region for framework contractors at short notice. To this end it maintains a large database of experts in the sub-region and mails opportunities to these experts on a regular basis to supply this market. Over the years MXA has become one of the larger suppliers of experts for EU contractors.

Second, MXA became involved in training, largely as a consequence of its involvement in the development of local economic development tools and training courses through one of its partners (Inwent). It then became involved in the roll out of training courses (and learnerships) in the areas of local economic development and integrated development planning. It has subsequently partnered with other organisations in providing training in monitoring and evaluation, cutting red tape, skills development facilitation and labour intensive construction methods.

All three elements of MXA's current activities (local tenders, training and donor work) have continued to grow. Our network structure comprising of a small management team, our associates and experts on our database continues to provide an effective vehicle for attracting top level expertise across gender and racial boundaries, as well as less experienced consultants looking to enhance their expertise and experience.