“We think WiseTech has been managed exceptionally well by its founder and CEO, Richard White. WiseTech has secured a dominant position in international freight-forwarding software, which is an inherently globally competitive market. We attribute this success to a rare combination of planning and execution.”
And White’s behaviour has roiled not just WiseTech but the broader technology sector. White was a board member of the Technology Council of Australia (TCA), a high-profile lobby group, which on Thursday announced that he would leave the board. He is also a philanthropist, donating regularly to coding education programs and “diversity in tech” initiatives.
And there are questions now about how much power White will still wield at the company he founded 30 years ago.
He will take on a “full-time, long-term consulting role, focused on product and business development”, with a title of “founder and founding CEO”. White’s new role could arguably be more influential than that of the CEO, who usually has to report directly to the board. As WiseTech’s largest shareholder, the board will now effectively report to him.
The unwinding of White’s influence will take longer than his resignation, and the broader sector has yet to reckon with how the alleged misbehaviour of him, and others in the industry, have continued for so long.