Optus CEO Kelly Bayer-Rosmarin quits

Optus CEO Kelly Bayer-Rosmarin has stepped down as CEO affective immediately after one of the nation’s worst mobile outages earlier this month. 

On November 8, Optus suffered a 12-hour outage affecting more than 10 million customers nationwide and impacting critical infrastructure such as payment, transport and hospitals.

In a statement, Bayer-Rosmarin said it had been an “honour” to serve as Optus CEO but it was an “appropriate” time to step down.

“On Friday I had the opportunity to appear before the Senate to expand on the cause of the network outage and how Optus recovered and responded,” she said.

“I was also able to communicate Optus’ commitment to restore trust and continue to serve customers. Having now had time for some personal reflection, I have come to the decision that my resignation is in the best interest of Optus moving forward.”

Bayer-Rosamarin was also leading the telco when it was hit by the biggest data breach at the time in September 2022 impacting 1.2 million customers where personal identification such as passport details and drivers licenses were leaked.  

In a statement, Yuen Kuan Moon, CEO at Singtel Group said, “We recognise the need for Optus to regain customer trust and confidence as the team works through the impact and consequences of the recent outage and continues to improve. Optus’ priority is about setting on a path of renewal for the benefit of the community and customers.”

Optus has appointed CFO Michael Venter to concurrently assume the role of interim CEO to focus on these priorities as it embarks on a global search for a new CEO.

Venter joined Optus as CFO in 2021, bringing 25 years of business experience in Australia and Asia to the role.

In addition, veteran global telecommunications executive and former Optus Business Managing Director Peter Kaliaropoulos will come on board on 22 November 2023 in the newly created position of COO, reporting to the interim CEO.

Last week, the federal government announced it would launch an investigation into the Optus outage.

Optus said identifying “preset failsafe” mechanisms in Optus’ routers as the cause of the nationwide outage.