Hackett to give up Internode MD role
Internode founder Simon Hackett has announced that he will step down from his executive role in the company to take up a position on parent company iiNet's board as of August this year.
Simon Hackett
(Credit: Internode)
Hackett decided to sell Internode — the internet service provider (ISP) he founded in 1991 — to iiNet in December 2011 for $105 million, and, at the time, he said he would be staying on to manage the separate Internode brand. He received a 7.5 per cent stake in iiNet as part of the deal, and said that he had no intentions of standing on the sidelines.
"I very much want to leave a substantial number of chips in this," he said.
But today, Hackett, who is currently in Las Vegas for a conference, told staff that because the integration of the iiNet and Internode systems has gone much faster than expected, he will leave his position at Internode to represent the company at the iiNet group level.
"While I will continue to represent Internode as I always have, I am keen to contribute at a group level, influencing the strategy of the entire iiNet group," he said.
"I think it's safe to say that the pace of integration of our networks and other systems has happened faster than anyone expected, which is a great thing," he said.
The announcement comes just a week after it was revealed that Internode's chief technology officer John Lindsay would expand his role to become the CTO of the entire iiNet Group. Michael Malone said that it made sense for the iiNet and Internode engineering teams to combine under Lindsay's leadership. The company also announced that Internode's general manager for Business and Government, Daryl Knight, will take on a that role for the entire iiNet Group.
Internode's low-profile CEO Patrick Tapper will leave the company at the end of July after 14 years of service to move to Queensland.
Hackett said that iiNet and Internode work so closely together that there won't be a need to replace the CEO or MD positions within Internode.
"Internode and iiNet already have a very close relationship across the executives of both companies, and this is just making it closer. The two companies have so much in common that this process has been pretty straightforward to date."