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Simon Walter Hackett is an Australian technology entrepreneur. He is the co-founder (with Robyn Taylor) of Internode, an Australian national broadband services company.
He is a 1986 graduate of the University of Adelaide, holding a bachelor's degree in Applied Mathematics and Computer Science.
Together with John Romkey, Hackett became the first to connect a commercial domestic appliance (a Sunbeam Deluxe Automatic Radiant Control Toaster) to the internet in 1990. [1]
Internode was founded in May 1991. In 1997 Hackett founded a subsidiary called Agile Communications [2] that was a licensed national telecommunications carrier and was the first South Australian based company to gain this license. [3] [4]
The Internode company group was sold to iiNet in a A$105 million transaction announced in December 2011 and completed on 31 January 2012. [5]
Hackett departed the executive team at Internode to join the board of iiNet in August 2012. [6] On 12 November 2013 it was announced that he had been appointed to the board of the National Broadband Network, and that he had resigned his position with iiNet. [7] He departed the board of the National Broadband Network in April 2016 and was replaced by Michael Malone. [8]
Other boards Hackett has served upon are: Adelaide Fringe Festival, m.Net Corporation., [9] and the Australian Network for Art and Technology. [10] Hackett co-founded and is a former director of The Internet Society of Australia, [11] and was the founding president of the South Australian Internet Association (which has since been disbanded). [9]
He is a fellow of the Australian Computer Society. [12]
While he was Managing Director of Internode, he was frequently active in the Internode forum on Whirlpool, [13] and is a vocal commentator on Australian telecommunications competition issues and Government policies. [14]
Hackett is the largest investor in ASX-listed company Redflow, [15] has served on its board (including as Chairman) and also spent a period as the company CEO before hiring others into both of those roles. [16] Hackett stepped down from the Redflow board effective at the 2018 AGM, while remaining involved in a technical role as Systems Integration Architect. [17]
Hackett is an advocate for electric vehicles. He imported the first Tesla Roadster into Australia and documented the process of driving it 501 kilometres (311 mi) on a single charge during the Global Green Challenge in Australia in 2009. [18] This was reported to be a new world range record for a production electric car at the time. [19] He subsequently appeared in testimonial for Tesla. [20]