Roxy Jacenko’s husband spent a year inside prison… now he’s set to make $447million after turning a very savvy investment into a fortune

Roxy Jacenko’s husband has turned a small investment into a huge fortune after venturing into the field of artificial intelligence.

Oliver Curtis’ personal investment of $250,000 in Singapore-based Firmus Technologies is likely to increase to $447 million after a new capital raise.

Mr Curtis helped launch the company from Tasmania in 2019 as operations director, while being barred by a court order from serving as director until June 2022.

The five-year sentence limited his business opportunities after he was released from prison a year after being convicted of conspiracy to commit insider trading.

Mr. Curtis started the company along with Tim Rosenfield and Jonathan Levee as an experiment to see if it could make computers mining Bitcoin cooler.

The company started after patenting a cooling fluid that ultimately allowed computers to use less energy amid soaring energy prices.

It continued to grow to meet data center demand for AI following a surge in interest in the sector.

Mr Curtis, now co-CEO, has moved to Singapore with his family, including daughter Pixie, 12, and son Hunter, 9, to be closer to Firmus.

Firmus targets billionaire investors such as Melbourne’s Pratt family and Alex Waislitz and is looking for a new round of investment.

According to the bank, the company hopes to raise an additional $597 million in equity and another $819 million in debt. Australian Financial Overview.

If the target is reached, Firmus’ valuation would rise to about $1.8 billion and Mr. Curtis’ stake in the company would be worth about $447 million.

The company would also fall under a new holding company in Singapore, which would control both Firmus and sister company Sustainable Metal Cloud.

“I don’t want to say that (Mr. Curtis) pulled a rabbit out of a hat because he worked very hard for it, but he is now in possession of a very golden rabbit,” said a source close to the businessman, who asked not to be named.

Firmus launched in Singapore thanks to a $150 million deal with the Singapore government’s ST Telemedia Global Data Centres.

The agreement saw the technology rolled out to 60 centres across the country and energy consumption halved.

Tech giants Nvidia and Dell Technologies supplied the technology, while Firmus launched Sustainable Metal Cloud to sell power and space in its own data centers.

This turnaround is a major step for Mr Curtis as he served one year of his two-year sentence in Cooma Correctional Centre before being released in June 2017.

He was found guilty of conspiracy to commit insider trading, which netted him and his then-friend John Hartman $1.43 million.

Judge Lucy McCallum said Curtis must have known what he was doing was “very wrong” but believed he could “avoid getting caught” when he was sentenced in 2016.

After his release, he told Daily Mail Australia that he tried to make the best of a bad situation during his captivity.

It’s a huge turnaround for the former investment banker who spent a year in prison (pictured, Mr Curtis being released in 2017) for conspiracy to commit insider trading

The happy couple now live in Singapore with their two children (pictured) so that Mr Curtis can be closer to Firmus as the company seeks more than $1.3 billion in investment.

“You have two ways of dealing with it. You shut down and you’re withdrawn and you stay to yourself — that’s not who I am,” he said.

‘Or you have to learn to live with it, adapt and fit in.’

Mrs Jacencko had initially remained in Australia, while Mr Curtis was based in Singapore because of his job at Firmus. However, in September the family moved to the island.

She told Daily Mail Australia that their relationship has improved now that the family is living under one roof and that they now have ‘no plans to come back’.

‘Ollie works harder than he’s ever worked in his life. We hardly ever see him, but [moving to Singapore] brought us all together in one house,’ she told Daily Mail Australia in March.

In the mornings Ollie is great. He makes breakfast for the kids and takes them out the door. We didn’t have that option before.

“Life is very different now. We are active parents together, which we never had the chance to do before.”