Superyacht border hopper Atomos exec Jeromy Young was cashed up after recent share sale

The Melbourne exec fined for cruising into Queensland to watch the rugby was cashed up after a massive share sale of his tech empire earlier this year.

Jeromy Young, co-founder and former chief executive of Atomos.

The Melbourne executive fined for cruising into Queensland to watch the rugby was cashed up after a massive $10m share sale of his tech empire earlier this year after over a decade building the company.

Business records show Jeromy Young in February sold down a large tranche of shares in Atomos — the company he co-founded in 2009 and helped list on the ASX in 2018.

Mr Young, who remains an executive director of the global video technology firm, on February 22 this year told the ASX he had sold 10 million shares, trousering $10.2m.

He is currently in mandatory isolation in Queensland after being fined $4135 for filing false border declarations along with his personal assistant from Melbourne, the superyacht’s 54-year-old Gold Coast-based skipper and its 55-year-old engineer who arrived in the state from Covid-ravaged Sydney last week.

He and the three others cruised into the Gold Coast to attend the rugby Test at Suncorp Stadium aboard Dreamtime which charters out at up to $18,000 per day.

The Dreamtime superyacht moored on the Gold Coast.

The company announcement in February details how the 44-year-old was going to use the money from the share sale.

It notes Claire Young, who was named as Mr Young’s spouse, was the other beneficiary in recognition for her role in helping build Atomos.

“Claire was instrumental in helping to build Atomos and Jeromy would like to acknowledge that fact and thank her for all efforts and support across the years,” the statement said.

“This share sale is the first time that either Jeromy or Claire have sold an interest in Atomos since the company was first founded in 2010 and results in an appropriate realisation for the efforts across the years.

“The proceeds will be used for a number of matters including the settlement of tax and other obligations and the purchase by Claire of a home.”

ASIC records show Mr Young’s residential address is a house in Hawthorn East, listed as low-set brick cottage in May last year.

Images from May 2020 of the Hawthorn East home listed as Mr Young’s address.

There’s plenty still left in the kitty also, with Mr Young owning or having an indirect interest in another 7.83 million shares, 432,955 options with an exercise price of 36c, 1.08 million with an exercise price of 41c, and 399,787 options with an exercise price of $1.21.

With the share price sitting at $1.21 on Thursday, the first two tranches of options are well in the money, and with the third lot exercisable out to June 30, 2029 there’s plenty of time for those to grow in value.

Mr Young was chief executive of Atomos when it listed in 2018 after raising $6m at a post-IPO valuation of $62.2m, and was then on a pay packet of $383,250 including super.

Atomos sells monitors used by video professionals enabling them to produce high quality content for social media, YouTube, TV or cinema.

The company is based in Melbourne with offices in the USA, Japan, China, the UK and Germany.

In the 2020 financial year Mr Young pulled in $478,019 in cash and options, down from $567,880 the previous year.

The company itself has not fared so well at least on the profit front, producing a net loss every full year from 2016-2020, ranging from $1.96m in 2019 to $22.1m in 2020.

Revenue has generally been on the up however, growing from $30.2m in 2016 to $44.7m in 2020.

Chris Tait, Chairman, Jeromy Young, former CEO and James Cody, CFO of Melbourne video tech firm Atomos.

In its most recent trading update, the now $268m company said unaudited sales of $77m in FY21 were up 73 per cent on the previous corresponding period, although investors will have to wait until mid-August for an update on the net result. The company delivered a profit of $1.74m for the first half on revenue of $32.7m.

Institutional investors on the register include Regal Funds Management, Ellerston Capital and Wilson Asset Management, with the latter becoming a substantial holder in March this year.

Mr Young moved from the chief executive job to a role titled “founder” in February, when he said he would be “focusing my time on creating and developing new product and revenue ideas, getting back to more of what I used to do 10 years ago when I (and Ian Overliese) founded Atomos”.

A search of company documents also indicates Mr Young set up a new company called Denshi Pty Ltd - Denshi translates as “electronic” or electrons” in Japanese - on February 19, just days after he stepped down from the CEO role.

Before launching Atomos he worked at fellow digital production products company Blackmagic and before that in Japan for audiovisual products company Grass Valley.

Atomos said on its Facebook page this week that it “is a personal matter” for Mr Young.

“Atomos fully supports appropriate measures to maintain COVID-19 safety,” the company added.

Its followers were not buying it however, with one saying “your ex CEO is still part of your business… if leadership tells us anything the values of a company come from the founders.

“The optics are terribly bad… I hope your board will take appropriate action to shift these optics immediately.’’

Mr Young has been contacted for comment.