Umthombo Springs Business Plan — The Company & the Water Source

Private company under the Companies Act 71 of 2008, incorporated 22 May 2025

The Company & the Water Source

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2.1 Corporate details

Item	Detail
Legal name	Umthombo Springs (Pty) Ltd
Registration number	2025/402118/07
Incorporation	Private company under the Companies Act 71 of 2008, incorporated 22 May 2025
Site	Farm Nkanyezi 148, Underberg district, Harry Gwala District Municipality, KwaZulu-Natal
Land tenure	30-year notarial lease over 18 ha including the spring and its protection zone, with option to purchase
Port distance	165 km by road to the Port of Durban
Brands	UMTHOMBO (PET, domestic and SADC) and UMTHOMBO ORIGIN (premium glass, export)
Capacity post Series A	12,000 bottles per hour PET line; approximately 14 million litres per annum at two shifts
Capacity post Series B	Additional premium glass line and PET uplift; approximately 34 million litres per annum
B-BBEE status	Level 2 contributor; 62% Black-owned including a community trust at the source

2.2 The spring

The Nkanyezi spring emerges from a confined fractured-sandstone aquifer in the southern Drakensberg foothills at approximately 1,480 metres above sea level. The catchment is undeveloped grassland with no industrial or intensive agricultural activity, and the recharge area sits entirely within land controlled by the Company or by conservation servitude. Independent hydrogeological assessment supports a sustainable abstraction well in excess of the Company’s Year-5 requirement, and the water requires no treatment beyond the filtration and disinfection permitted for natural spring water.

Parameter	Position
Source type	Natural spring from a confined aquifer, gravity-fed to the bottling hall
Assessed sustainable yield	Materially in excess of the Year-5 abstraction requirement, with monitoring boreholes installed
Water use licence	Granted under Section 21 of the National Water Act 36 of 1998; abstraction volumes and monitoring conditions specified
Source protection	Fenced protection zone; no grazing, cultivation or vehicle access within the inner zone; quarterly catchment inspection
Quality profile	Low total dissolved solids, naturally balanced mineral profile, consistently within SANS 1657 limits
Treatment permitted	Filtration and ozonation only, consistent with the regulatory definition of natural spring water
Monitoring	Continuous flow and level monitoring; monthly full chemical and microbiological analysis by an accredited laboratory

2.3 Shareholding at incorporation

Figure 4. Shareholding at incorporation.

Shareholder	%	Nature & role
Nkanyezi Holdings (Pty) Ltd	54%	Founder vehicle; contributed the lease, the water use licence application, hydrogeological work and R6.0m of cash
Sibanye Beverage Partners (Pty) Ltd	24%	Co-founder vehicle of the commercial and export team; contributed R3.0m and the export channel relationships
Nkanyezi Community Trust	14%	Broad-based trust for the communities within the source catchment; vendor-financed, repaid from distributions
Founding management	8%	Direct holdings of the operations and technical leadership

Founding ownership is diluted through the two funding rounds as set out in Section 16. The Plan states that the community trust holding is protected by anti-dilution provisions funded pro rata by the founder vehicles, so that community participation is not eroded by the capital the business requires. Section 16 examines what that commitment costs.