Board of Directors
Rick Bettle (Chairman)
MBA, Dip BA, FINSTD, FAICD
Mr Bettle’s professional background is in pastoral, professional and legal services. He has held senior roles with the New Zealand Dairy Group, Wrightson, Alliance Group Limited and Kensington Swan. Mr Bettle is currently a director of Goodman Property Trust, Eastern Hi Fi Limited, Diligent Board Member Services, Civil Aviation Authority (NZ Government), and Ovita (joint venture between NZ Meat & Wool and Agresearch). He was a director of Natural Gas Corporation for 6 years. Mr Bettle was appointed to the Board of Powerco in May 2009.
Andrew Knight
BMS (Hons), Chartered Accountant
Mr Knight’s professional background is in accounting and energy. He has previously held senior roles in energy companies in Australia and New Zealand, including Vector Limited, Natural Gas Corporation, Australian Gas Light Company, and Fletcher Challenge Energy. Prior to joining the Board of Powerco, Mr Knight was Divisional CEO (Gas) and General Manager (Metering) with Vector, and General Manager (Corporate Development) and General Manager (Energy Sales) with Natural Gas Corporation. He is currently a director of New Zealand Oil and Gas Limited and Watchman Capital Limited. Mr Knight was appointed to the Board of Powerco in May 2009.
Dr Tom Parry
AM, BEc, MEc, PhD
Currently, Dr Parry is Chair of Sydney Water Corporation, First State Super (superannuation fund) and the Australian Energy Market Operator. In addition, Dr Parry is a Director of ASX – Market Supervision, a consultant to listed infrastructure fund Duet Limited and Director of a number of not for profit organisations. Dr Parry has held a number of important positions in regulation and public policy. Previous roles include 12 years as Executive Chairman of the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART) of New South Wales; Foundation New South Wales Natural Resources Commissioner; Director of the New South Wales Clinical Excellence Commission; Associate Commissioner of the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission; Director of South East Sydney Area Health Service; and a member of the New South Wales Council on the Cost and Quality of Government. Dr Parry has over 35 years experience as an academic, business and public policy consultant, in the financial sector and as a regulator. He has been Head of the School Economics, University of New South Wales and Dean, Faculty of Commerce, University of Wollongong.
Dr Parry was appointed to the Board of Powerco in June 2010.
Jonathon Sellar
B BUS, Chartered Accountant
Mr Sellar is Chief Financial Officer, Australian Operations at Brookfield Infrastructure. Prior to his role at Brookfield Infrastructure Mr Sellar was Chief Financial Officer of Babcock & Brown Infrastructure Limited. Prior to joining BBI, he was Project Controller of InterGen's Australian power stations. Before InterGen, Mr Sellar was Senior Audit Manager (Energy and Mining) at PricewaterhouseCoopers in Brisbane, which included a two and a half year secondment to the UK. He holds a Bachelor of Business (Accountancy) degree from the Queensland University of Technology, and has been a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Australia since 1996. He was appointed to the Board of Powerco in December 2005.
Stewart Upson
Mr Upson joined Brookfield as Senior Vice President in March 2010 and leads the capital transactions group at Brookfield in Australasia which is responsible for mergers and aquisitions activity in the region.
Prior to Brookfield Mr Upson held the role of General Manager Business Development of BBI (Prime Infrastructure) from December 2008. In this role he had responsibility for corporate transactions and strategic planning processes, including new revenue generation initiatives for assets within BBI’s portfolio.
Mr Upson was previously employed in the infrastructure origination group at Babcock & Brown and prior to that was BBI’s Group Treasurer, joining BBI from Powerco in 2005 where he was Treasurer. Mr Upson also worked at Deloitte, Auckland Branch within the Corporate Finance division for two years, specialising in valuation, transaction support and capital structure advisory.
Mr Upson holds a Bachelor of Commerce with first class honours in finance from the University of Auckland. He is a CFA charterholder and has been a member of the CFA Institute since 2001.
Ross Israel