Evan William Thornley (born 1964), is an Australian entrepreneur. Thornley was founding chair of

Per Capita ''Per capita'' is a Latin phrase literally meaning "by heads" or "for each head", and idiomatically used to mean "per person". The term is used in a wide variety of social sciences and statistical research contexts, including government statistic ...

and National Secretary of the

Australian Fabian Society The Australian Fabians (also known as the Australian Fabian Society) is an Australian independent left-leaning think tank that was established in 1947. The organisations said aims are to “contribute to progressive political thinking” as w ...

. He was a board member of the

Brotherhood of St Laurence The Brotherhood of St Laurence is an Australian not-for-profit organisation working toward an Australia free of poverty. The Brotherhood (as it is colloquially known) has its headquarters in Melbourne but provides services and programs across Au ...

and the Chifley Research Centre, was a founding director of

GetUp! GetUp! is an independent progressive Australian political activist group. It was launched in August 2005 to encourage Internet activism in Australia, though it has increasingly engaged in offline community organising. GetUp is an independent ...

. Along with his wife, he founded

LookSmart LookSmart is an American search advertising, content management, online media, and technology company. It provides search, machine learning and chatbot technologies as well as pay-per-click and contextual advertising services. LookSmart also li ...

, the first Australian

dot-com company A dot-com company, or simply a dot-com (alternatively rendered dot.com, dot com, dotcom or .com), is a company that does most of its business on the Internet, usually through a website on the World Wide Web that uses the popular top-level domain ". ...

listed on the

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. During the

dot-com bubble The dot-com bubble (dot-com boom, tech bubble, or the Internet bubble) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s, a period of massive growth in the use and adoption of the Internet. Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Compo ...

, his stake in the company was worth almost $1 billion, but its value declined by 99% as the bubble burst. He is also a co-founder of the Goodstart Consortium - a social enterprise that owns the largest childcare network in the world (formerly called ABC Learning). He was formerly the CEO of Better Place Australia and Global CEO of Better Place LLC, a now-defunct company which intended to supply

electric car An electric car, battery electric car, or all-electric car is an automobile that is propelled by one or more electric motors, using only energy stored in batteries. Compared to internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles, electric cars are quie ...

s and the

charging Charging may refer to: * Charging (ice hockey), when a player takes more than three steps before checking an opposing player * Battery charger, a device used to put energy into a rechargeable battery * Charging station, a device used for rechargi ...

or switching stations to support them. Thornely has recently started a property management company to better serve the Australian Property Market named LongView. Thornley served in public office for two years as the

Labor Labour or labor may refer to: * Childbirth, the delivery of a baby * Labour (human activity), or work ** Manual labour, physical work ** Wage labour, a socioeconomic relationship between a worker and an employer ** Organized labour and the labour ...

member of the

Victorian Legislative Council The Victorian Legislative Council (VLC) is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Victoria, Australia, the lower house being the Legislative Assembly. Both houses sit at Parliament House in Spring Street, Melbourne. The Legislative Co ...

for the

Southern Metropolitan Region Southern Metropolitan Region is one of the eight electoral regions of Victoria, Australia, which elects five members to the Victorian Legislative Council (also referred to as the upper house) by proportional representation. The region was create ...

, and as Parliamentary Secretary to

Premiers Premier is a title for the head of government in central governments, state governments and local governments of some countries. A second in command to a premier is designated as a deputy premier. A premier will normally be a head of governm ...

Bracks and

Brumby A brumby is a free-roaming feral horse in Australia. Although found in many areas around the country, the best-known brumbies are found in the Australian Alps region. Today, most of them are found in the Northern Territory, with the second l ...

Background and early career

Thornley attended

Scotch College, Melbourne (For God, for Country, and for Learning) , established = , type = Independent, day and boarding , gender = Boys , denomination = Presbyterian , slogan = , ...

and is a graduate of the

University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb nor ...

. He commenced his university studies in 1983 and served in full-time elected student office as President of the

Student Representative Council {{Unreferenced, date=July 2014A students' representative council, also known as a students' administrative council, represents student interests in the government of a university, school or other educational institution. Generally the SRC forms par ...

, and then in the National Union of Students in 1987 and 1988. He completed a Bachelor of Commerce and a Bachelor of Laws degree in 1990, and from 1991 to 1995 he was a consultant at

McKinsey and Company McKinsey & Company is a global management consulting firm founded in 1926 by University of Chicago professor James O. McKinsey, that offers professional services to corporations, governments, and other organizations. McKinsey is the oldest and ...

, a management consultancy firm.

Political career

Elected to the

Parliament of Victoria The Parliament of Victoria is the bicameral legislature of the Australian state of Victoria that follows a Westminster-derived parliamentary system. It consists of the King, represented by the Governor of Victoria, the Legislative Assembly and ...

in 2006, he served as Parliamentary Secretary assisting the

Premier Premier is a title for the head of government in central governments, state governments and local governments of some countries. A second in command to a premier is designated as a deputy premier. A premier will normally be a head of governm ...

on the National Reform Agenda and Innovation until his resignation on 31 December 2008. He is a noted donor to various progressive causes, including the Australian Labor Party. On 28 December 2008, Thornley announced that he would resign from the Victorian Parliament, despite speculation that he would be chosen to serve as a minister in

John Brumby John Mansfield Brumby (born 21 April 1953) is the current Chancellor of La Trobe University and former Victorian Labor Party politician who was Premier of Victoria from 2007 to 2010. He became leader of the Victorian Labor Party and premier ...

's government. His resignation was received angrily by some Labor colleagues who thought his decision "insulting" and a "disgrace." He had been appointed as the CEO of Australian operations for Better Place, a company promoting electric cars. A joint sitting of the Legislative Assembly and the Legislative Council of the Victorian Parliament was required to select a new member to fill the vacancy caused by Thornley's resignation. It was the first casual vacancy to occur since the reform of the Legislative Council in 2006. Under the new rules, which mirror those of the

Australian Senate The Senate is the upper house of the Bicameralism, bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives (Australia), House of Representatives. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Chapter ...

, if the vacating MLC had been elected as a member of a political party, the joint sitting must select a person nominated by that political party. On 30 January 2009, it was announced that Melbourne lawyer

Jennifer Huppert Jennifer Sue Huppert (born 13 October 1962) is an Australian politician. Born in Melbourne, Victoria, she was a solicitor before entering politics. On 3 February 2009, she was appointed to the Victorian Legislative Council as a Labor member for S ...

had been nominated by the ALP to fill the upper house vacancy.

Post-political career

Having served as the Australian head of Better Place since his resignation from parliament, Thornley was elevated to global CEO of the company following the sacking, in October 2012, of its founder and major spokesperson

Shai Agassi Shai Agassi ( he, שי אגסי, born April 19, 1968) is an Israeli entrepreneur. He is the founder and former CEO of Better Place, which had developed a model and infrastructure for employing electric cars as an alternative to fossil fuel tec ...

. However, Thornley severed his connection with Better Place only three months later. In January 2014, he became executive chair of Same Business Different Outcome (SBDO), a

private equity firm A private equity firm is an investment management company that provides financial backing and makes investments in the private equity of startup or operating companies through a variety of loosely affiliated investment strategies including leve ...

. He is now executive chair of LongView, a property management company.

Connection to Israel, Judaism

Thornley first went to Israel on a Young Political Leaders' Tour while at University and was part of a pro-Israel group humorously dubbed "the Mossad faction". He led an Australia Israel Chamber of Commerce trade mission to Israel in 2008 and has been a delegate to the Australia Israel Leadership Forum several times. He was Secretary of the Parliamentary Friends of Israel and visited Israel over 30 times during his tenure at Better Place. He was a member of the strategic review panel for the Rabbinical Council of Victoria. Thornley began a formal process of converting to Judaism in 2012 under Rabbi Adam Stein at Kehilat Nitzan, Melbourne's only Conservative synagogue. Thornley formally completed the conversion process on 19 August 2014 and adopted the Hebrew name of "Lev Yonatan".

References

External links

*
Scotch College profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Thornley, Evan 1965 births Australian Labor Party members of the Parliament of Victoria Businesspeople from Melbourne Living people McKinsey & Company people Members of the Victorian Legislative Council People educated at Scotch College, Melbourne Politicians from Melbourne Melbourne Law School alumni 21st-century Australian politicians Converts to Judaism Australian Jews