Property, tech entrepreneurs feature on young rich list

Perth businesspeople are surprisingly prominent on the latest BRW young rich list, with a local apartment developer ranked number three with an estimated fortune of $536 million.

The 100-strong list includes 10 people who live in Perth or got started in business in Perth.

Blackburne Property Group managing director Paul Blackburne made his debut on the list at number three.

Blackburne Property is a major player in the development and marketing of apartment projects in Perth, along with the likes of Finbar Group, Psaros and TRG Properties.

BRW does not explain how it calculated Mr Blackburne’s estimated worth of $536 million.

However, to put it in perspective, that number is double the current market capitalisation of listed company Finbar, which for many years has been the market leader in Perth apartment projects.

Business News will have an in-depth report and ranking of WA apartment developers in the print edition out on Monday November 9.  

Another new entrant this year is former Perth business partners Cliff Obrecht and Melanie Perkins, who founded online design platform Canva.

They have an estimated worth of $60 million.

That valuation is presumably based on a $US15 million funding round Canva completed last month with venture capital investors in Australia and the US.

Publicity material released at the time said the deal valued Canva at $US165 million ($A230 million).

BRW’s numbers imply Mr Obrecht and Ms Perkins have retained a 26 per cent stake in Canva.

WA property players on the young rich list include Nicheliving director Ronnie Elhaj and MLG Realty chief executive Marcus Gilmore.

Also on the list are Palermo Chartered Accountants director John Palermo and Rory Vassallo, who made his fortune building up a chain of day care centres.

Linkforce Engineering founder Luke Herbert and Northern Star Resources managing director Bill Beament also made the list.

Mr Beament was ranked number 15 on Business News’s recently published Wealth Creators list of directors holdings, a position which is compared solely on the value of shares in listed companies.

The BRW young rich list is headed by the co-founders of Sydney-based software company Atlassian, Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar, who have a combined wealth of an estimated $2.3 billion.