From talented teen to budding team owner, Justin Hickey declares Tasmania can survive in the NBL

JUSTIN Hickey has read and heard all the reasons on why Tasmania can’t sustain a top flight sporting club in a national code

Justin Hickey of Melbourne at the Derwent Entertainment Centre. Justin is throwing his money behind the state's NBL bid. Picture: SAM ROSEWARNE.

JUSTIN Hickey has read and heard all the reasons on why Tasmania can’t sustain a top-flight sporting club in a national code.

The state is too small, the north-south divide, not enough economic value, the list goes on.

And it is these reasons he is throwing a part of his sizeable fortune behind proving the doubters wrong.

Hickey is the man with deep pockets who is bankrolling the state’s push to gain an NBL licence, and he will leave no stone unturned in his quest to do so.

With the AFL fumbling the ball and A-League turning its back on the state, Hickey is ready to strike for basketball.

“I have always wanted to own some sort of sports team, and now having the money I thought I may as well try and start,” Hickey told the Mercury in an exclusive interview.

“You would be surprised of the dramas that happen in Tassie sport, particularly the AFL, then the A-League team not getting up and the NBL expansion, it is always at the forefront of the [interstate] media.

“Tassie gets a lot of airtime in the Herald Sun and the Age and on TV about the lack of a presence, that is a big driver for me, not so much about sticking it up them, but showing we can make it a sustainable model and we will be competitive.

“People don’t think Tasmania can sustain financially, long term, a national sporting franchise.

“That’s why they seem to get fobbed off, and that’s what we are driving home now, that we have a business case that breaks the mould.”

A former St Virgil’s College student, Hickey was a talented junior who had both basketball and football fighting for his services.

When he was just 16 when he became the youngest ever Hobart Hornets debutant in the then Continental Basketball Association (now SEABL) in 1993, and he was in the last Devils squad in 1996 when the side was booted from the NBL.

Injuries eventually saw him quit sport and he moved to Melbourne when he was 20.

He began buying and selling businesses, paving the path for his incredible success which now sees him as managing director of Digital Elder — A BRW Fast 50 company — HumblAbode, HydraPlay and Director Tickanova to name a few.

Hickey preparing for the Around the World race in 2004 at the Royal Melbourne Yacht Squadron, Williamstown.

Hickey is also a keen yachtsman, having contested the likes of the Sydney and Melbourne to Hobart’s, as well as competing in the Around the World race in 2004.

But it was business interests which led to him crossing paths with Chargers president David Bartlett close to a decade ago, and in the past year the two have joined forces to fast track Tasmania’s NBL bid.

“David is obviously into tech and I have a couple of really big tech companies, one of them has 70 staff and we have offices all over Australia as well as London and Florida,” Hickey said.

“I ran into him somewhere and we have touched base ever since.

“I can’t remember where it was but we caught up and got chatting via email and for him it was just the struggle of not having someone being able to structure up something like an NBL team as a business,” Hickey said.

“All the ducks lined up really, we just kicked off about a year ago and are now at the point where we are nearly ready to launch.”

Through Hydraplay, Hickey has already put an unsolicited offer into the Glenorchy City Council to buy the Derwent Entertainment Centre and adjacent land, a critical piece of the puzzle for the NBL bid.

And while the lure of owning a national sports franchise is great, as a businessman Hickey has grand plans and is prepared to pour $80 and $90 million to turn the area into a sports and entertainment precinct.

“Tasmania has great food and wine, there is Mona, it has awesome tourism, but it doesn’t have the events coming in as well.

“Putting my business hat on, that’s really why I’m looking at it. It is a potential gold mine if we put the money into it and structure it right and run it as a proper business.

“Not just basketball but other sporting events, I have some other things in mind as well given we will potentially own the ticketing system so we can put our own events on.”

Last week the NBL announced it would expand in 2019-20, with a licence granted to business­man Romie Chaudhari, despite there being no location or name for the team.

Unperturbed, Hickey will forge ahead with or without official backing from the league.

“We’re still looking at 2019, that hasn’t and won’t change. It is a big risk for me, it is happening regardless of the NBL or not.

“The way I see it, you can’t run an NBL competition on eight teams, you can’t run it on nine teams, you really need to run it on 12 to 14.

“We have done a lot of work on this and when we present it — it should come out in the next couple of weeks — the name, the design, the tag lines, the colour schemes, they will see how far advanced we are.”