Combined Motor Holdings (CMH), the Durban-based car dealer and rental group, has lost its chief executive at a point when its leadership was already being reshaped. In a JSE announcement released on 3 November 2026, the board said group CEO Jebb McIntosh died on Monday, 2 November. The notice names no successor and sets out no interim arrangement. That leaves shareholders in a company valued at roughly R2.6bn with a question the company has not yet answered: who runs the group from here.
What the CMH board announced
The notice, published on the JSE’s news service on the afternoon of Tuesday 3 November, says McIntosh “dedicated his life to building CMH” and served on the board from 1976, according to the CMH announcement as carried by Moneyweb’s SENS archive. It lists the family he leaves behind and quotes chairman James Dixon, who said McIntosh was “having a typical day in the office” until the moment he died.
The announcement is a tribute and a notice of death. It does not say who becomes group CEO, whether the board has appointed an acting chief executive, or when it will say more. It also does not give his age. Moneyweb reports that he was 80, while Business Day puts him at 79. We could not settle the difference from the company’s own notice.
A succession plan was already under way
The death comes after the company had started to move authority away from McIntosh. In June 2025, Business Day reported that CMH said Charles Webber, head of its motor retail and distribution division, would take on a more significant role. At the time the company said McIntosh would remain CEO but would take a lesser part in day-to-day activity. Business Day described the arrangement as one that essentially made Webber a co-CEO. Webber joined the group in 2000 as dealer principal of its Umhlanga Toyota-Lexus dealership and was promoted to CEO of the motor retail and distribution division in 2024, according to that report.
The same announcement said long-time chief financial officer Stuart Jackson would step down from that role and that company secretary Priya Govind would be appointed CFO designate. Business Day’s 4 November report says the company never gave a date for McIntosh’s departure or spelled out the full succession arrangements, and that the latest notice does not say whether Webber now becomes group CEO.
Facts and inference need to be kept apart here. The fact is that Webber already carried a larger share of daily management than he did two years ago. Whether the board will make him group CEO, name someone else, or split the job is not stated anywhere we could find, and any forecast of the outcome is guesswork.
Why the group’s circumstances raise the stakes
McIntosh was not only the chief executive. He co-founded the group with Maldwyn Zimmerman in 1976, became CEO in 1999 and, according to a May 2025 Business Day profile, was the longest-serving chief executive among JSE-listed companies. Business Day also reported that he, Jackson and Bruce Barritt, who runs the First Car Rental business, are CMH’s largest shareholders.
That matters because of a related-party deal that is still unfinished. In August, Business Day reported that CMH signed an agreement to buy 13 properties from companies and trusts linked to McIntosh, Jackson and Barritt for about R745m, after a 4.5% discount on an April valuation of R780m. The properties, in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng, produced about R87m in gross rent in the 12 months before the valuation. Because the sellers are linked to directors, the transaction is a Category 2 related deal and needs shareholder approval at a general meeting, the same report said. CMH planned to borrow about R350m and pay the rest from cash, which stood at R1.145bn at the end of the 2026 financial year in February, according to that article.
One of the sellers has now died. We have not seen any statement on whether the death changes how the estate or family trusts hold their interest, or whether it affects the timetable for the shareholder vote. Those are open questions, and the company has not addressed them.
The trading backdrop the next CEO inherits
CMH sells vehicles in a market that is growing. The industry body’s October figures, covered in our report on new vehicle sales rising 10.4% to 61 890 in October, show demand recovering. The competitive picture is changing faster than the sales totals suggest. Our earlier piece on how Motus expects some of the 22 Chinese car brands to fail shows how quickly new entrants are taking share from established brands, and dealers must choose which of them to back. Used-vehicle pricing is also moving, as we covered in cheaper Chinese cars squeezing used-vehicle values.
CMH reported a 33% rise in headline earnings per share for the year to February, Business Day wrote, and it has had trouble putting its cash to work. A buyback it launched in December 2025 at R35.50 a share returned R192m of a possible R400m, the same report said, after about half of shareholders took part. Choosing brands, deciding what to do with surplus cash and handling a related-party property purchase are all decisions that now sit with a board and executive team missing their longest-serving member.
What this means for shareholders, staff and customers
For shareholders, the near-term issue is clarity. Markets generally want to know quickly who holds the chief executive’s authority, and the notice does not say. CMH shares were at R37.50 at the Moneyweb close on 3 November, before most readers had seen the announcement; we have not verified how they traded on 4 November.
For employees, the company’s own website says the group operates only in South Africa and employs 2 555 people. A leadership change of this kind rarely changes branches or contracts quickly, and nothing in the notice suggests it will. For customers of its dealerships and First Car Rental outlets, the notice says nothing about service or operations, and we found no sign of disruption.
For other JSE-listed companies, the case is a reminder of a point Business Day made in 2025, when it raised the age and tenure of CMH’s leadership: boards with long-serving founders need a named successor in place long before one is needed. Our own earlier coverage of a planned handover, such as Boxer’s appointment of Justin Galloway as CEO as Marek Masojada retires, shows the other approach, with the successor named when the outgoing CEO’s retirement was announced.
What is still unknown
- Who will serve as group CEO, and whether the appointment is interim or permanent.
- Whether Webber, who already had expanded duties, is the board’s choice.
- Whether the CFO handover from Jackson to Govind is complete. Business Day calls Govind CFO designate, and the 3 November notice does not address it.
- Whether the R745m property deal still goes to a shareholder vote on its original timetable, and whether the death changes the position of the sellers.
- How many dealerships the group runs today. Moneyweb cites 102 dealerships and 51 rental outlets, while Business Day’s 4 November report uses 43 dealerships and 50 rental branches, figures that match its 2025 coverage. We have not been able to reconcile the two.
The board has not said when it will update the market. Until it does, CMH’s 2 555 employees, its shareholders and its dealer partners are working from a condolence notice and an older succession plan.
