Pacific Equity Partners wins gong for backing Aussie smart meter business

The Australian Investment Council has awarded Pacific Equity Partners (PEP) its Large Cap Investment Award for its 2018 investment in Intellihub, Australasia’s leading smart metering business, and the subsequent sale in April 2022 of a 50% interest to the Brookfield infrastructure Fund (Brookfield), generating significant returns for PEP’s investors.

Accepting the Award, Cameron Blanks, Managing Director for PEP said: “We are very honoured to be able to accept this Award which recognises what Private Equity can do when your mission is to build businesses and back vision.”

“The success we have had building Intellihub into a multi-billion dollar business began with the foresight of Adrian Clark – former CEO of Intellihub who is now CEO of Intellihub’s technology offshoot CrescoNet – and the belief in smart meter technology and the role it could play in Australia’s changing energy landscape.

“The ongoing success is a great testament to the skill, dedication, hard work of the team at Intellihub led by Wes Ballantine and supported by PEP and Brookfield.

“Intellihub is in my view indisputably Australasia’s leading smart metering and digital energy management business. They’ve achieved an enormous amount – but we all most certainly believe the best is yet to come,” Mr Blanks said.

“Under PEP, the Intellihub business was built from three separate carve outs: Acumen from Origin, Mercury from Metrix, and Intellihub from Landis+Gyr, our [preferred] meter supplier / technology partner.”

PEP first invested in Intelllihub through its Secure Assets Fund I in 2018 growing the business before ultimately attracting Brookfield as a 50% partner in 2021.

The transaction followed a global process and Brookfield was eventually selected on the strength of its bid and PEP’s perception of its ability to partner with PEP to help drive Intellihub’s business to stay at the forefront of Australia’s energy transition.

The transaction put the Secure Assets Fund I in the top quartile for infrastructure investment performance. PEP’s Secure Assets Fund I’s remaining 50% stake will be rolled into a Continuation Fund, a market-first innovation in the Australian market and allowing investors to stay on the Intellihub journey.