From a Corner Shop Selling Salt to a $3 Billion Empire: The MeTL Story Tanzania Can’t Stop Talking About
Decades ago, in a rural Tanzanian village, a small family shop sold salt by the gram because that’s all customers could afford. Nobody at that counter could have guessed the business would one day cross $3 billion in annual revenue. Yet that’s exactly where MeTL Group stands today, cementing its place as one of Africa’s most formidable industrial powerhouses.
The man behind the transformation, Mohammed “Mo” Dewji, didn’t inherit a conglomerate. He inherited a mindset. His father spent grueling hours hauling goods across Tanzania’s difficult terrain at a time when roads, financing, and infrastructure barely existed to support ambition. Dewji took that inheritance — grit, not glamour — and, after returning home from Georgetown University, made a decision that reshaped Tanzania’s economic map: instead of simply growing the family’s trading business, he would build factories.
Why This Milestone Matters
Speaking recently at the Standard Bank Africa Unlocked conference in Cape Town, Dewji laid out the numbers, and they’re staggering:
- $3 billion+ in projected annual revenue for 2026
- 40,000+ jobs across the group
- 11 African countries with active operations
- 50+ product categories manufactured, from edible oils to textiles to soap
- Up to 5% contribution to Tanzania’s GDP
But the real story isn’t the size of the number — it’s what it represents. Dewji has been blunt about the philosophy driving MeTL: Africa, he argues, cannot build lasting wealth by shipping out raw materials and buying back finished goods at a markup. That belief pushed MeTL beyond trading and into manufacturing — turning underperforming factories into productive ones, often with Dewji himself walking the factory floor rather than sitting behind a desk.
What’s Next: Graphite, and a Bet on the Future
MeTL isn’t resting on textiles and cooking oil. The group is now pouring roughly $275 million into graphite mining and processing — a mineral that happens to be the single largest component, by weight, in the lithium-ion batteries powering the world’s electric vehicles. Tanzania sits on some of the richest graphite deposits on the planet, concentrated in Lindi, Morogoro, and Tanga.
Commercial production is expected to begin within about 18 months. Rather than exporting raw ore, as many foreign-owned mining operations have historically done, MeTL intends to refine the graphite domestically — starting at roughly 94% purity before scaling up to battery-grade material for direct export to Europe, Japan, and South Korea. It’s a calculated play: as Western automakers race to cut ties with Chinese-dominated mineral supply chains, Tanzania could become an indispensable link in the global EV battery chain.
Add to this a planned luxury resort on a 150-hectare island near Zanzibar and a safari lodge in the Serengeti, and it’s clear Dewji isn’t just chasing a bigger balance sheet — he’s chasing a $10 billion revenue target by 2035.
Why It’s a Win for Tanzania
For ordinary Tanzanians, this isn’t just a billionaire’s success story. MeTL’s factories mean tens of thousands of jobs, from factory floors to farms to logistics networks. Its push into local value-addition — processing graphite instead of exporting raw minerals — means more revenue, taxes, and skills stay inside the country rather than flowing offshore. And its expansion into 11 African markets carries the Tanzanian flag into new territory, proving that African-owned capital can build industries once dominated by multinationals.
MeTL’s rise is a reminder that Africa’s next chapter of growth may not come from foreign investment alone — but from homegrown conglomerates willing to bet big, stay patient, and build from the ground up.