When he was 19, Mikkel Vestergaard Frandsen left school, went hitchhiking and wound up in Cairo, where he met a couple of Nigerian wheeler dealers.

They told him about some “easy business” importing trucks, but he eventually decided he would be better off without partners. So Mr Frandsen began his business life by striking out alone in Africa, importing trucks to Lagos until the 1993 military coup sent him scurrying back to his family company in Denmark.