Renewable vitality activist Mike Cannon-Brookes has succeeded in his marketing campaign to shake up the board of vitality big AGL with shareholders voting at at the moment’s annual basic assembly to appointment 4 new administrators to the AGL board on the advice of the Atlassian cofounder’s household VC agency, Grok Ventures.
Former Vitality Safety board chair Kerry Schott, former Tesla Vitality director Mark Twidell, Swinburne College chancellor John Pollaers, and CSR director Christine Holman the place all again in a majority vote as impartial directos, with Twidell the one one to obtain board endorsement.
Shareholders additionally gave the corporate a “first strike” warning vote towards the corporate’s remuneration report.
It’s the most recent win for Cannon-Brookes since his marketing campaign to speed up AGL’s shift to renewables started in February with an preliminary $5 billion takeover bid for Australia’s greatest carbon emitter.
After two takeover gives have been rejected, Cannon-Brookes spent $650 million to amass an 11% stake in AGL by way of Grok Ventures, after which started an in the end profitable marketing campaign towards AGL’s demerger plan.
AGL chairman, Peter Botten, and CEO, Graeme Hunt, resigned as a consequence, together with plenty of different administrators, when the demerger was deserted.
At the moment’s board shakeup additionally places a cloud over the continued tenure of latest chair Patricia McKenzie, who can also be chair of NSW Ports and the Sydney Desalination Plant Group.
The corporate had opposed the nominations of Schott, Pollares and Holman on the grounds that they lacked the “further expertise and expertise vital to make sure the profitable implementation of the board’s technique”.
In response to at the moment’s vote, McKenzie mentioned: “The board welcomes these new administrators to the board and can work constructively with them in the very best of pursuits of shareholders”.
Brynn O’Brien, Government Director, The Australasian Centre for Company Duty (ACCR), mentioned at the moment’s vote made historical past with shareholders sending a transparent sign to Australian listed firms on dealing with local weather threat.
“That is each a victory for shareholders and a scathing indictment on those that spent years destroying shareholder worth by delaying the inevitable within the face of an escalating vitality transition. It’s important that classes are discovered from AGL’s colossal waste of time and shareholder funds,” he mentioned
“The boards of different high-emitting firms needs to be paying attention to at the moment’s consequence: local weather threat administration is an ever rising stress and people who stay flat-footed within the face of quickly shifting market dynamics will probably be held to account.”
O’Brien’s evaluation of the brand new chair was scathing, saying McKenzie, an AGL director for 3 years, “has taken the flawed flip” since her appointment.
“Patricia McKenzie needs to be held accountable for her poor judgment since assuming the function of Chair. From her adversarial relationship with AGL’s largest shareholder to her dismissive angle in direction of the talents and experience of impartial director candidates who shareholders have now roundly endorsed,” he mentioned.
“The primary strike AGL obtained on remuneration additionally demonstrates the Chair’s misreading of the expectations of huge shareholders.
The subsequent rapid problem AGL faces earlier than grappling with its vitality transition is to discover a new CEO to switch Hunt.
