Where are they now? Energy bosses made hundreds of thousands from failed companies

As households fear about their vitality payments this Christmas, one group can have no such anxieties: the bosses of failed vitality corporations who waltzed off with hundreds of thousands. They have gone on to quite a lot of ventures and new careers since overseeing companies that left 1000’s of shoppers within the lurch.

Some, having made their fortunes, grace the halls of academia. One is a visiting fellow at Oxford University and one other is learning for a PhD at Cambridge in addition to advising an oat milk maker.

Others have determined to remain within the business world, working companies concerned in every thing from inexperienced constructing supplies to large batteries.

Under an ill-fated drive to extend competitors within the vitality market, a myriad of small suppliers – typically with inexperienced bosses on the helm and little capital – have been allowed to tout for customized.

At least 73 suppliers entered the market between 2010 and early 2012. It all went horribly unsuitable two years in the past when vitality costs went by the roof and it grew to become clear that many enterprise fashions have been extraordinarily weak.

Bulb was the most important of a wave of corporations that went beneath in late 2021 and early 2022. According to the Public Accounts Committee, £3 billion of taxpayer funds are dedicated to funding it and there’s a additional £2.7 billion estimated shortfall for 28 suppliers which failed earlier than Bulb.

The stress has eased since then, with costs of pure gasoline, in opposition to which all UK vitality prices are based mostly, round 86 per cent decrease than their peak in August final yr.

Since the beginning of 2021, 32 suppliers went into chapter 11, in keeping with information from Citizens Advice. At the time of writing, 22 suppliers stay, with many of the prospects from bust companies having been hoovered up by the Big Six suppliers, British Gas, EDF, E.ON, Ovo Energy, Octopus and Scottish Power.

So, the place are the bosses of a few of these failed companies now?

Bulb

RUNNING GREEN COMPANIES

Founders: Hayden Wood and Amit Gudka

Customers: 1.7 million

Pocketed: £8.5 million

Hayden Wood, 40, a marketing consultant, arrange Bulb in 2015 with Amit Gudka, 39, a former Barclays vitality dealer and DJ.

The firm grew quickly to turn out to be one of many UK’s largest suppliers. But a failure to hedge in opposition to actions in vitality costs hit the corporate exhausting.

Wood and Gudka are reported to have made greater than £8.5 million between them by gross sales of shares within the enterprise.

Wood admitted that he was paid a £250,000 annual wage by the taxpayer after the agency collapsed as a result of he remained as chief government till it was purchased by rival Octopus final December.

He just lately based Beams, which goals to make housebuilding and renovations extra environmentally pleasant. Gudka runs a battery storage agency known as Field which in July obtained a £200 million money injection from DIF, owned by personal fairness group CVC.

Pure Planet

STUDYING FOR PHD

Founders: Steven Day, Andrew Ralston and Chris Alliott

Customers: 235,000

Pocketed: £30 million

Two telecoms executives, Steven Day, 56, and Andrew Ralston, 61 joined forces with ex-financial analyst Chris Alliott, 51 to create Pure Planet in 2015.

The enterprise collapsed six years later, regardless of being part-owned by vitality supermajor BP. Its prospects have been later taken on by Shell Energy.

The co-founders have been estimated in March to be in line for payouts of over £10 million every as a result of a £43.7 million surplus on the agency when it went into administration.

Day is learning for a PhD on the ‘real-world impacts of sustainability-educated graduates’ at Robinson College, Cambridge. He can also be an advisor to MYOM, an oat milk firm based mostly in St Albans, in addition to laptop design group Factory 42.

On social media platform LinkedIn, Ralston describes himself as a clear tech vitality and telecoms ‘advisor’ however he offers no additional particulars.

The trio could also be establishing store collectively once more. In May this yr, a administration consultancy agency known as Equidria was created on Companies House.

The enterprise lists Day, Ralston and Alliott as shareholders in its founding doc.

People’s Energy

FELLOW AT OXFORD UNIVERSITY

Founders: Karin Sode and David Pike

Customers: 350,000

Pocketed: £50 million

Married couple Karin Sode, 53, and David Pike, 59, arrange Edinburgh-based People’s Energy by a crowdfunding marketing campaign in 2017, wherein they pledged to deal with gas poverty within the UK. Customers of their failed enterprise have been later taken on by British Gas.

Sode and Pike, who owned 25 per cent of the corporate, are in line to stroll off with round £50 million. Since People’s Energy went bust, Sode has labored a number of jobs.

A communications professional, she spent eight months final yr as a managing director at YSC Consulting, a part of Accenture.

She is a visiting fellow on the Said Business School at Oxford University and likewise works as a non-executive director at Social Enterprise UK, a lobbying group.

Pike, a educated engineer, seems to have tried to department out into retail. Last yr, he was tweeting about Ethibuy, an internet procuring web site dubbed ‘the moral various to Amazon’.

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Avro Energy

IN BUSINESS WITH DAD

Founder: Jake Brown

Customers: 580,000

Pocketed: £4.3 million

Former non-league soccer participant Jake Brown, 29, was a curious determine to arrange an vitality firm. Despite apparently having no background within the trade, he based Leicestershire-based Avro with a household mortgage in 2016.

Its prospects have been later rescued by Octopus Energy.

Brown earned an estimated £4.3 million from the agency.

He remains to be listed as a director at Sentido Marketing, which he controls together with his father Philip.

Sentido funnelled greater than £4 million from Avro by ‘administration prices’ earlier than it went bust. The firm’s accounts are listed as overdue.

Jake and Philip are additionally nonetheless working Berkeley Swiss, a property growth agency, which printed accounts just a few months in the past.

In the outcomes for the yr to September 2022, Berkeley reported that it had obtained £757,000 in loans from Sentido, taking its excellent stability to £2.9m.

Together Energy

RUNS CONSULTANCY FIRM

Founder: Paul Richards

Customers: 176,000

Pocketed: Share of £1 million

Former British Gas employee Paul Richards, 41, who says his mum used to ship him to mattress early to save cash on electrical energy, arrange Together Energy in 2016.

The group was backed by Warrington Council.

Its shoppers have been taken on by British Gas when it went beneath. Richards loved a slice of at the least £1 million in wage funds.

Since Together went bust, Richards has arrange Clyde Ventures, a Glasgow-based consulting enterprise that markets itself as ‘specialists in training, integration, consulting and manufacturing.’ Interestingly, his time at Together will not be talked about in his biography on the agency’s web site, merely saying he has labored ‘extensively’ within the vitality, water and property markets.

Which is a distinct tone to the person who beforehand mentioned he was ‘able to exceeding the achievements of a few of the UK’s largest family manufacturers’.