Finlaysons Wine Roadshow 33 – THE GRAPE RE-SET

Speaker: Ned Hewitson, General Counsel and General Manager, Regulation at Wine Australia

Speaker: Anna Hooper, Director, Economic & Environmental Policy, Australian Grape & Wine

Speaker: Tim Mableson, SA Clients & Markets Lead Partner, Deal Advisory | National Wine Advisory Lead, KPMG

Speaker: Will Taylor, Wine Partner, Finlaysons

Speaker: Michael Butler, Tax & Revenue Partner, Finlaysons

Ned is General Counsel and General Manager of Regulation at Wine Australia, having previously held the position of Legal Counsel.

He has responsibility for Wine Australia’s regulatory and market access functions, including oversight of the Label Integrity Program, maintenance of the Register of Geographical Indications and Other Terms and administration of the export controls.

He has a deep and diverse wine industry background, which includes:

• working as a cellar hand and undertaking vintages in Hunter Valley, Barossa Valley and McLaren Vale;
• working in various domestic and foreign sales, distribution, retail and hospitality roles;
• show judging; and
• teaching undergraduate students.

Prior to commencing at Wine Australia, Ned worked for over six years in the Finlaysons Wine Group as a wine industry focussed corporate and commercial solicitor.

Ned holds a Bachelor of Commerce and Bachelor of Laws from the University of Adelaide, graduating with First Class Honours; a Graduate Diploma in Legal Practice; a WSET Diploma in Wines; and a Diploma in European Wine Law from the University of Reims Champagne-Ardernne, where he was dux of the class.

Anna Hooper is the Director of Economic and Environmental Policy at Australian Grape and Wine. A wine industry professional since the late 90’s, she has worked in vineyard management and winemaking both in Australia and overseas, and later as General Manager of a medium sized winery, vineyard and cellar door in coastal South Australia. She has been a non-executive director on private and government boards in the fields of biosecurity, natural resource management and grape and wine business and currently sits on the board of Landcare Australia. Immediately prior to the formation of Australian Grape and Wine she gained experience in national advocacy as Chief Executive Officer of Australian Vignerons. Having worked across a broad range of roles, including practical hands-on industry experience, she is well placed in her role to promote the best interests of the sector on domestic policy issues relating to environmental and economic sustainability. She has led the sector’s response to the national competition policy review including the parallel inquiries by both the Government and the Senate into the grape and wine regulatory environment and the voluntary Code of Conduct for Australian Winegrape Purchases. Her current focus is on facilitating industry input into the potential design of a mandatory code for winegrape purchases, developing a fit for future governance model for Sustainable Winegrowing Australia and leading the review of industry levies.

Lisa Scott, Director, Government Relations, Australian Grape & Wine, will deliver Anna’s presentation at certain seminars.

As a Deal Advisory and Turnaround & Restructuring professional, Tim provides hands-on expertise to assist companies, lenders and other stakeholders achieve results from complex and challenging advisory, restructuring and turnaround situations.

Although Tim has wide-ranging experience across a number of industries, he specialises in the wine industry and agribusiness. He works with a variety of stakeholder groups to manage and sell businesses and assets on both a formal and informal basis, conduct assessments/reviews as well as determining and implementing strategies for financial and operational improvement.

Tim is a regular contributor to thought leadership in the Australian wine sector, and his capability in the wine industry and agribusiness is demonstrated by the many highlights he has achieved throughout his career. He was the administrator of McWilliam’s Wines Group (one of the first families of wine in Australia), including trading operations for a 16-month period, restructuring and sale of business via a Deed of Company Arrangement.

Tim advised a vertically integrated wine business suffering significant trading losses and cash flow problems with debts over $40 million to implement transformation strategies to improve profitability, cash flow and regain financier support.

He undertook a confidential review of capital allocation of a Group’s portfolio of businesses, including an assessment as to the realisable value of the assets of the wine business to support a proposed transaction by family members. The deliverable was a report assessing the assets (including desktop valuation of wine inventory) and liabilities on the balance sheet and modelling under a range of scenarios to achieve the best outcome.

Tim also acted as an advisor to a family run operation involving extensive cropping, sheep and wool production across four sites in three states to restructure roles between family members and assess modelling to advise on funding options for the total farming enterprise.

Will leads Finlaysons’ Wine Group. His practice has, for over 30 years now, been focused virtually solely on the wine sector. He has extensive experience acting for large and small participants in the wine industry, in relation to mergers and acquisitions, business structures, joint ventures, capital raising, succession planning and their general commercial activities such as entering into supply, processing and distribution contracts and competition and consumer law.

Will has a Bachelor of Economics, Bachelor of Laws and Master of Laws (Companies and Securities) from the University of Adelaide and a Graduate Diploma of Finance and Investment of the Securities Institute of Australia (dux SA Division).

Will acts for wineries all over Australia, large and small, as well as for a number of international wine businesses.  He sits on a number of boards and is Chair of Partners of Finlaysons.

Michael has extensive experience advising wine industry clients on tax matters across the full lifecycle of vineyard and winery businesses—including acquisition, operation, and sale. He regularly advises on Wine Equalisation Tax (WET), excise, GST, and income tax issues, with a particular focus on structuring vineyard and winery sale transactions to maximise tax efficiency and minimise risk.

Michael acts for a wide range of industry participants—from boutique winemakers to major producers and investors—on matters such as cellar door arrangements, brand and asset sales, succession planning, cross-border operations, and WET compliance and disputes. His insights into the commercial and regulatory nuances of wine business sales have helped clients achieve successful outcomes in complex transactions across multiple jurisdictions.

In addition to his wine sector work, Michael advises on capital gains tax (CGT), company and trust taxation, property development and subdivision, international tax, and estate and business succession—particularly for families with cross-border assets or migrating to Australia.