Entrepreneur Shane Yeend locked in court battle with long-term business partner Kevin McLean over more than $1.5 million

Outspoken Adelaide entrepreneur Shane Yeend has been taken to court by his long-term business partner Kevin McLean.

Shane Yeend, who has been a long-term advocate of building a helipad near the CBD.

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Entrepreneur Shane Yeend is locked in a $1.5 million-plus tussle with a long-term business partner who is also looking to have him booted out of one of their companies.

Kevin McLean, who has been a business partner of Mr Yeend for more than 20 years, has lodged a Supreme Court action looking to freeze or recoup more than $1.5 million and have Mr Yeend removed as a director of their company, Imagination Holdings.

The pair achieved great success starting in the mid-1990s, with their Battle of the Sexes suite of products – TV, radio, boardgame and internet assets – proving lucrative.

The pair appear to have fallen out in recent times however, with Mr McLean resigning from one company they were both directors of last year and asking the court for compensation from Mr Yeend and for orders freezing other funds.

Two interlocutory applications have been filed asking the court to make orders including:

– that Mr Yeend pay Mr McLean $375,000 in “equitable compensation”

– that Mr Yeend contravened a number of sections of the Corporations Act relating to directors’ duties

– that Mr Yeend be removed as a director of Imagination Holdings, and

– that Mr Yeend be restrained from accessing the bank accounts of that company.

Orders have also been sought to stop Mr Yeend removing $463,399 paid by Peregrine Corporation and $US234,012 paid by Cardinal Industries from any bank accounts under his control.

Mr Yeend, through his lawyers, has so far agreed not to deal with the assets or intellectual property of Imagination Holdings, pay one amount, and preserve more than $400,000 held in bank accounts until late last month.

Mr McLean’s two interlocutory applications, and the orders they seek, have been adjourned, and the parties have been directed to engage in mediation before April 23.

Mr McLean declined to comment on the matter as it was before the court. Mr Yeend, who is overseas, did not respond to an email and could not be contacted by phone.

Mr Yeend is well-known in Adelaide for business endeavours including buying the rights to Humphrey B Bear in 2012, non-exclusive rights to the Hollywood sign in 2013, and more recently, spearheading a push to grow cannabis commercially in South Australia.

That lead to a high-profile falling out with former premier Jay Weatherill, who Mr Yeend threatened to sue, while also promising to spend $1 million campaigning against his re-election.

Mr Yeend said in 2017 that his company, The Australian Cannabis Corporation, had approached the Weatherill government seeking help in its bid for a federal medical cannabis cultivation licence needed to make medicinal marijuana on a commercial scale at the former Holden car factory site, but was rebuffed.

Mr Yeend later took out full-page advertisements in the Sunday Mail criticising the government for its inaction and threatened to sue Mr Weatherill, claiming he “launched into a tirade, a centimetre from my nose” at an event in the city.

Mr Weatherill confirmed at the time that a confrontation had happened, saying he “certainly wasn’t prepared to tolerate” Mr Yeend’s “inappropriate behaviour”.

It is understood Mr Yeend’s threatened law suit never eventuated.

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