Capital gains: national player merges with local leader to enter Canberra accounting market

Intimate knowledge of the Canberra market has led a plucky young Canberra accounting and business advisory firm to national success in just three years.

Ben Weber and Angus Kenyon put “everything on the line” to make a standing start from their lounge rooms during COVID and have just announced their firm, Link Capital Partners (LCP), will merge with leading mid-tier accounting firm William Buck next month.

William Buck NSW managing partner and William Buck Group board member Greg Travers said LCP was their pick as it scouted for a partner in the Canberra market.

“When we started talking to the LCP team, it struck us that they had a really good core practice in the general accounting and tax space, which is central to the business,” he said.

“They also have great connections within the Canberra market. LCP is at the beginning of their journey, but the relationships they’ve built with staff and clients go much deeper than those few years. One of the clients we met had been with them for 15 years.

“For us, when we’re doing something, we want to be part of the community we’re operating in, and LCP is. From our perspective, that’s a brilliant starting point from which to build the type of firm we want to build in Canberra.”

The merger will see Ben, Angus and LCP chartered accountant Domenic De Marco join William Buck as partners, bringing their entire team with them.

Ben and Angus, who come from “two old Canberra families”, have known each other since their schoolyard days and worked together for five years before striking out on their own.

Now with 23 staff and a client base in Sydney and Canberra, Angus said the mutually beneficial merger was the ideal way to take the Canberra success story to the next level.

“William Buck reached out to us about six months ago, and after looking into the business, we could see there were a lot of synergies. The way they’ve created their business is really exciting and a good fit with what we wanted to do and how we want to achieve it at LCP,” Angus says.

“We’re excited to work with like-minded people who have a similar focus and the same sort of clients as we have. It gives us a solid foundation for future evolution, which will benefit our staff and clients.”

Both firms have a “middle market focus”, with a clientele consisting of private businesses and family wealth, but the merger of LCP’s foundations with William Buck’s full suite of technical services and deep industry experience will drive economic growth in the region, allowing the new firm to take on work for smaller government entities.

William Buck was recently appointed to the panel of the Australian National Audit Office, enabling the firm to build on its existing government practice.

Mr Travers said William Buck was well-equipped to work with government agencies, assisting them in promoting transparency and accountability in their use of public resources.

“Utilising our mid-market expertise and commercial approach, we are set to offer a wide range of valuable services, including audit and tax advice,” he said.

“That kind of work will allow us to have an impact in Canberra. Getting a company on board that sees that opportunity and wants to be a part of it was a really critical piece.

“We want to do something tangible and valuable for every client we work with, and this will give us the ability to use some of those specialist skills like auditing to benefit those smaller government entities.”

Angus said the future was looking bright.

“We’ve always done things fundamentally different to other accounting firms, and we’ve been able to do that because our team is second to none. That enables us to provide great service and a client-centric approach,” he says.

“The merger with William Buck provides us with a great foundation to build something really special in Canberra. Our local knowledge, combined with the backing of a national firm, is pretty powerful.”

The merger will take effect on 1 July 2024.