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ActewAGL CIO to focus on TransACT

ACT energy utility ActewAGL has begun the search for a new chief information officer after incumbent Carsten Larsen left last Friday.
Written by Suzanne Tindal, Contributor

ACT energy utility ActewAGL has begun the search for a new chief information officer after incumbent Carsten Larsen left last Friday.

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Carsten Larsen
(Credit: ActewAGL)

The executive had been carrying out both the CIO position within ActewAGL, as well as the general manager technology, strategy and operations for associated telco TransACT.

"What I'm doing is offloading some of my responsibility," he told ZDNet.com.au. "Working two jobs for two different companies was fun for a while but was not sustainable long term," he said. As of Monday, Larsen has started consulting as general manager systems technology and operations for TransACT.

Despite the fact that he had already been filling that position for five months, he has to go through a selection process with the TransACT board before formally being awarded the job because the position, which had been a managed service provided by ActewAGL, will now be an in-house operation.

"TransACT is now a profitable company and is now moving on to looking after its own affairs more and more," he said. Board approval of the appointment could take up to three months, he said, but the CIO was "quietly confident".

The position's name change has come about because the person filling the role may also be in charge of the company's IT requirements in the future.

Until now TransACT's IT has been provided as a managed service by ActewAGL, but the costing will be carried out to see if it makes sense to move it in-house.

If such a transition were to take place, it would take around 12 months, Larsen said, saying it took him four years to put the IT systems together. The new CIO for ActewAGL would need to be handling that migration.

Larsen believed the successful applicant would enjoy their role. "ActewAGL's a great company and if anyone wants to apply for the job, they will have a great future ahead of them," he said.

When asked how he felt about the TransACT role, Larsen was ebullient.

"Last Friday I had two big offices and today I only have one, and that's really nice," he said. "It was becoming quite stressful, never knowing if the meeting was at one place or the other place."

Questioned on whether he thought TransACT would benefit from having more of his attention, he answered "I certainly hope so. I will be very disappointed with myself if that is not the case."

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