SkyCity Entertainment Group Limited has advised that it intends to appoint Silvana Schenone, Julian Cook, and Chad Barton as Non-Executive Directors to the SkyCity Board following a Director search undertaken by SEQEL Partners.  These appointments remain subject to approval by regulatory authorities in each of the gaming jurisdictions in which SkyCity operates, a process that normally takes some months to conclude. In the meantime, they will each be available to assist the SkyCity Board in an advisory capacity.

Silvana Schenone is a corporate partner at MinterEllisonRuddWatts in Auckland where she leads the firm’s Corporate division. She has extensive expertise in mergers and acquisitions, private equity investments, takeovers, schemes of arrangements, capital raisings, and corporate governance matters. Ms. Schenone is recognised internationally for her commercial acumen and negotiation skills and is a thought leader on corporate governance issues. Committed to championing greater diversity, Ms. Schenone is a founding member of OnBeingBold. She is also a Board member of the New Zealand Takeovers Panel and holds a Master of Laws from Harvard University. Prior to joining MinterEllisonRuddWatts in 2007, Ms. Schenone was a corporate lawyer at Sullivan & Cromwell LLP in New York and prior to that at Cariola Diez Pérez-Cotapos in Chile.

Julian Cook is the outgoing Chief Executive Officer of Summerset Group Holdings Limited. Prior to becoming Chief Executive Officer in 2014, he was Summerset’s Chief Financial Officer where he oversaw the company’s transition to become a publicly listed company on the New Zealand Stock Exchange and Australian Securities Exchange (ASX). Prior to joining Summerset in 2010, Mr. Cook was an Associate Director at Macquarie Group where he gained significant experience in the energy, industrial services, tourism, and aged care sectors over a 12-year career. Mr. Cook is currently a member of the Executive Committee for the New Zealand Retirement Villages Association and holds a Master of Finance from Victoria University and a Master of Science from the University of Waikato.

Chad Barton has extensive experience across finance, capital markets, mergers, acquisitions, and property development has been the Chief Financial Officer of ASX-listed companies The Star Entertainment Group Limited from 2014 to 2019 and Salmat Limited from 2009 to 2014. Prior to this, he was Chief Financial Officer of the Australia and New Zealand business of Electronic Data Systems from 2006 to 2009. Mr. Barton, as founding Chairperson, established Women in Gaming & Hospitality Australasia to achieve gender equity and support the development and success of women in the gaming industry. He is currently a director of NeuRA (Neuroscience Research Australia) Foundation and a member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and Chartered Accountants ANZ and holds a Bachelor of Business from the University of Technology in Sydney.

SkyCity Chair, Rob Campbell, commented that “the SkyCity Board is delighted to have secured Silvana, Julian, and Chad. They bring considerable expertise and diversity, both individually and collectively, to the SkyCity Board in terms of their backgrounds and thinking”.