Arvid Petersen is Chairman of Petersen Group. Based in Sydney Australia, Petersen Group is a diversified investment company focussing on private equity, private debt, global equities, property and other family office related entities. Their private equity investments are primarily in private education and hospitality.
Mr Petersen has had a long and successful history in private education with his first investment in 1994. A founding shareholder of Study Group Australia, Mr Petersen led the growth of the company prior to selling to Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT) in 2003.
In 2006 Mr Petersen partnered with CHAMP private equity to buy the global operations of Study Group. After growing the business significantly over the ensuing five years, the company was then sold to Providence Equity Partners in 2010. Mr Petersen remained on the board and retained a significant shareholding until the company was sold to Ardian in 2019.
In 2014 Mr Petersen partnered with CHAMP Ventures in the acquisition of Australian Institute of Management Education and Training (AIM), later acquiring Ivy College and creating Scentia Education Group which he is currently Chairman.
Prior to his involvement in private education, Mr Petersen spent many years in the soft drink industry with Pepsi Cola, coming to Australia from Canada in 1989 to establish Pepsi Cola Bottlers Australia, where he was the founding Managing Director.
Mr Petersen serves on the boards of Scentia Education and the Petersen Family Foundation.
Previous to joining Scentia Ben was the CEO of CareerOne where he turned the business from a large loss-making position to profitability through customer-centric product positioning and building a strong team culture.
Prior to CareerOne, Ben worked at Singtel Optus where he was Product Marketing Manager of Prepaid Mobile, was General Manager of Strategy and then Managing Director of PPS, Singtel Optus’s largest subsidiary.
Ben has a Law Degree and a Bachelor of Commerce (Marketing) from Canterbury University, New Zealand. He completed his MBA from Barcelona Business School, Spain in 2005.
Jeremy was Dean and director of the Australian Graduate School of Management from 1980 until 1989. He then continued as a Professor in the School until January 2006 having been appointed to the Australian Mutual Provident Society Chair of Management. He was elected President of the Academic Board of UNSW (1994-98), serving two terms on the University’s Council.
In 1970 Jeremy joined the Boston Consulting Group (BCG), a leading management consulting firm specialising in corporate strategy. After working in Boston and Paris, he was appointed Vice-President and director for San Francisco where he established the BCG’s West Coast office. Immediately prior to joining the AGSM, Jeremy was BCG’s Vice-President and Director-General for France.
Jeremy is an experienced company director, having served on the boards of Transurban Group, Singapore Power and SP AusNet, the Australian Stock Exchange and the Australian Industry Development Corporation. He has chaired the boards of Capral Aluminium and AIDC Limited, together with several private companies.
Andrew is the CEO and Founder of Roland Investments, an investment and consulting company specialising in the for-profit education sector, financial management and driving growth in SMEs.
Prior to founding Roland Investments, Andrew was the longest serving executive director at global education provider, Study Group. Over a period of 17 years, as part of the executive management team, Andrew was instrumental in the growth of the business from a UK one-school, 80-student start-up college to a leading global education group. During this time, he lived in the UK, USA and Australia.
Prior to his time at Study Group, Andrew was involved with a number of multinational companies within the healthcare, automotive and financial services sectors.
Andrew is currently a Non Executive Director of Endeavour College of Natural Therapies.
Andrew is a Fellow of the Chartered Association of Certified Accountants and a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Directors.
Peter is Managing director of Greyrock, a private investment company with investments across all asset classes with a focus on education and technology. He is also a Venture Partner at Ligo Partners leading the EdTech vertical and a director of ASX-listed EDU Holdings (ASX: EDU).
He has 20+ years’ experience as an entrepreneur and executive operating within the private education industry, across higher education, vocational and corporate training sectors.
Peter is a 2 times exited founder - 1 to a global listed education business and 1 to private equity – with public and private company experience as a founder, CEO, executive, non-executive director and chair. With degrees in commerce and law, he is admitted to practise in the Supreme Court of NSW, Chapter Chair of YPO Sydney and is a graduate of the AICD Company Directors Course.
