Less than three years after putting "their families and careers on the line", re-mortgaging their homes and starting from ground zero, the founders of Link Capital Partners Ben Weber and Angus Kenyon have announced the business' merger with leading accounting firm William Buck.
Mr Weber, 42, and Mr Kenyon, 36, both Canberra born and bred, say it's a great reward for all the stress of setting up their accounting and advisory business in September, 2021, during a pandemic lockdown, with no staff and no clients.
Today, Link Capital Partners has 23 staff, a healthy client database and plans to expand with more Canberra-sourced staff through the merger with William Buck.
The merger will also see them shift their operations slightly north along National Circuit, from their current digs in the Burns Centre to the Doma Group's new showpiece office block at 23 National Circuit, the building made from largely renewable timber, a first for Canberra.
Mr Weber said it "meant a lot" that William Buck approached them about a possible merger with a firm he described as "up and coming, with a lot of vibrancy".
"We put our families and careers on the line when we started so it is validation that we've done something that someone thinks is valuable. And not just someone but William Buck, the No.6 accounting firm in Australia," Mr Weber said.
"So a large, reputable company likes what we've created and thinks it has value."
Mr Kenyon, Mr Weber and Domenic De Marco will join William Buck as partners, bringing with them their entire existing team - and then adding to it.
"We'd anticipate within 12 to 18 months to have somewhere between 40 and 50 staff and we'll be moving into the new premises later this year to accommodate that," Mr Weber said.
"The William Buck guys have also been very determined that we will hire all the staff from Canberra. We're going to grow it organically with local Canberra professionals."
They feel a massive sense of achievements and are thankful to their families and staff in backing them while they took a risk.
"We're quite proud of ourselves because it will set up us up from a business sense and a personal sense, for life," Mr Weber said.
Mr Weber, who went to Daramalan College and the Australian National University, and Mr Kenyon, who went to the Canberra Grammar School and University of Canberra, are both married with three children.
"I actually went to school with Ben's younger brother and then we coincidentally started working together about five years ago," Mr Kenyon said.
They took a leap of faith to start their own firm - being literally hands-on across the board in what had been "an exciting but also very stressful couple of years".
"We do everything, the payroll, the administration, the HR, manage the staff, manage the clients, do the actual accounting work, which also has to get done, and the business has grown," Mr Weber said.
William Buck Group board member and William Buck NSW managing partner Greg Travers said the merger represented a significant milestone for the firm.
"Link Capital is a firm distinguished by its robust practices and strong relationships in the ACT," he said.
"This merger lays a solid foundation for growth, and we plan to strategically expand our expertise to better serve client in the region."
