WiseTech co-founder Maree Isaacs joins billionaire ranks

Tech entrepreneur Richard White has broken into the top 10 of the Richest 250 for the first time, but his software firm also now accounts for three other billionaires.

WiseTech co-founder Maree Isaacs is now a billionaire on paper.

Forget unicorns like Canva or Atlassian.

Richard White’s WiseTech Global is the biggest Australian technology company success story this year.

So quickly has the logistics software firm grown in value that it has now produced four billionaires – more than any other Australian corporation.

The latest is the little-known Maree Isaacs, who has worked alongside White for more than three decades and, on paper, has become Australia’s 17th female billionaire.

Isaacs and White started the business in 1994 when the pair began writing code for Australian freight forwarders and floated it on the ASX in 2016.

It has since gone on to be one of the most successful floats in Australian business in recent years. Isaacs is WiseTech’s head of licence management and is also company secretary and a long-time executive director.

Maree Isaacs

One of the most successful Australian female tech executives, Isaacs previously worked with White at Real Tech Systems Integration and Clear Group.

With her shareholding in WiseTech, other assets and estimated cash holdings from dividends, Isaacs’ estimated paper wealth is now about $1bn.

WiseTech shares have risen almost 80 per cent since January 1 and the company now has market capitalisation of almost $30bn on the ASX.

It also means that White, whose estimated wealth of almost $11bn is now above big names such as Kerry Stokes, James Packer, Lindsay Fox and Lang Walker, has broken into the top 10 of The List – Australia’s Richest 250 for the first time.

White, the one-time guitarist who washed dishes at his grandfather’s function centre aged 11, is WiseTech’s biggest shareholder and is joined in the billionaire ranks by his co-founder Isaacs and two of WiseTech’s early investors, Michael Gregg and Charles Gibbon.

Gregg and Gibbons’ large WiseTech stakes account for the majority of their now estimated paper fortunes of $1.55bn and $1.12bn respectively.

Gregg worked at retailers Grace Bros and Nock & Kirby then TNT Australia before a spell at Link Communications led to him becoming managing director of listed health software firm HCN.

Charles Gibbon.

An early investor in HCN was Gibbon, who has also had a diverse career in the financial services sector. Gibbon trained as an econometrician, worked as an analyst for a London stockbroker and then managed institutional money in Australia with Schroders.

He later established his own funds management business, introducing index investing to Australia in the mid-’80s. That business was later acquired by Macquarie and Gibbon became a foundation investor in the forerunner of Quadrant Private Equity.

Gibbon and Gregg went on to become early investors in the then private WiseTech in 2005, and Gibbon would then become chairman from 2006 through to 2018. They both remain large shareholders, though Gregg retired from the WiseTech board last year.

White told WiseTech’s annual general meeting last year than when Gregg and Gibbon joined the business as its first outside investors, “we had a vision that most thought was impossible.

“Charles and Mike infused us with confidence and gave us the financial support we needed to globalise WiseTech.

“They provided critical review, alternative views, and profound insights, and always helped improve our decisions.”

White has been steadily selling WiseTech shares in recent years to increase its liquidity. He paid about $43m to take over listed data firm Kyckr in January and shelled out a record $27.5m for a house in Sydney’s Palm Beach. He is also putting $50m into a technology education foundation.

Gibbon and Gregg have become founding partners of investment firm Shearwater Capital, which has invested in media start-up Scire.

Originally published as WiseTech co-founder Maree Isaacs joins billionaire ranks