Judo Bank co-founder Joseph Healy to step down as CEO

Judo Bank co-founder and CEO Joseph Healy will depart the SME bank in the coming months, seven years after launching a financial institution designed to provide a better deal to entrepreneurs.

The bank confirmed Healy will stand down as CEO on March 19, with current deputy CEO and chief relationship officer Chris Bayliss set to take over the role.

Healy will remain at Judo Bank until June 28 to act as an advisor to Bayliss through the handover.

In a statement, Judo Bank chairman Peter Hodgson called Healy a “visionary” who believed SMEs were being “underserved by our Australian banks”.

“Joseph has successfully led the bank through all its important foundational milestones since 2016 — proving the customer value proposition, recruiting an industry leading team, obtaining a banking licence, raising $1.5 billion in equity, and transitioning the bank to the public equity markets,” Hodgson said.

Healy and co-founder David Horney shared some of what it took to raise this amount of capital in their book, Black Belt: A masterclass for start-ups and entrepreneurs.

In an extract from the book, published in SmartCompany in May 2023, Healy and Horney explained that between 2015 and 2019, they travelled extensively to meet with international investors, after discovering a lack of Australian investors interested in their plans to build a new Australian bank serving Australian SMEs.

In a note shared to the Judo Bank team on Tuesday morning, Healy called his tenure at Judo Bank the highlight of his career, and said the business will carry on in the right hands.

“As a leader, I’ve always believed it to be one of my key responsibilities – to ensure a seamless transition, at the right time, with the right person,” he said.

“It is in many ways the defining legacy of any departing CEO, and I’m very proud to leave this team in exceptional hands.”

Healy said he will focus on personal projects in the months and “planning my next career adventure, whilst being available to support Chris as needed.”

News of Healy’s departure arrives at the same time as the bank’s 2024 half year report, which shows pre-tax profits of $67.4 million, up from $54.3 million in the back half of 2023.

Its loan book sits at $9.7 billion, up from the $8.9 billion in loans and advances tallied in June 2023.