Gadget guy turns rubbish into a successful company

When he was a teenager with a bright mind, Mark Gaskin scoured rubbish dumps for discarded electronic equipment and even stole robotics manuals to study. Fixing the old gadgets would have unintended consequences — some blew up and, in one case, set fire to his home. Three decades later, he is a successful Nelson Mandela Bay businessman and owner of MSG Systems, a leader in technology in SA.

From a young age Gaskin had a keen interest in how things worked. “My favourite pastime growing up was going to the local rubbish dump and finding broken electronic treasures that people had thrown away and trying to fix them. I used to blow a lot of things up and set fire to the house once, but it was a great way to learn.”

He failed matric in his technical high school, missing the pass mark in Afrikaans, but didn’t let it hold him back and became an apprentice. “As an apprentice you are normally assigned to work with a journeyman and along the way I was assigned to collect two robotics engineers from the airport every Monday and carry their tools and assist them. They used to enjoy a drink after work, and I ended up sitting in the car waiting to drive them home.

Source: News Formal (newsformal.com)

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