Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin resigns
Optus chief executive Kelly Bayer Rosmarin has resigned effective immediately from the telecommunications company after a year of turmoil for the business.
Singtel, Optus' parent company, announced Bayer Rosmarin had tendered her resignation on Monday after facing a grilling by a senate inquiry on Friday following a lengthy Optus outage several weeks before that left 10 million customers disconnected.
"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," Bayer Rosmarin 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.
"It's been an honour and privilege to lead the team at Optus and to serve our customers.
"I am proud of the team's many achievements and grateful for the support of the Optus team, Moon, and the Group. I wish everyone and the company every success in the future."
Singtel Group's CEO Yuen Kuan Moon said Bayer Rosmarin had delivered "improved financial performance, market share gains, innovation and higher employee engagement" during her time in the top job.
"Optus appointed Kelly at the beginning of the pandemic, and we acknowledge her leadership, commitment and hard work throughout what has been a challenging period and thank her for her dedication and service to Optus," Moon added.
Moon said Bayer Rosmarin always had stakeholders' best interest at heart but the company needs to regain customer trust and confidence moving forward.
Until a new CEO is appointed, Chief Financial Officer Michael Venter will take on the role as interim chief executive.
It comes after a torrid 14 months for the telco, which began with a major data breach in September 2022 and then - at least under Rosmarin's leadership - ended with a mass network outage.
The outage left millions of Aussies without mobile and internet but even more dangerously, caused hundreds of triple zero calls to go unanswered.
Bayer Rosmarin faced a Senate inquiry last Friday admitting the company's performance during the outage "was not acceptable".
"We let you down and for that, I am deeply sorry," she told the inquiry.
During the inquiry, Bayer Rosmarin dodged questions about her quitting the top job but three days later tendered her resignation.
Even on Monday when Bayer Rosmarin resigned, residents in Melbourne's west woke to no mobile service after an "underground fibre break" led to disruptions to mobile, voice and data services.
The telco apologised to customers in the Melton area affected by this.
In September 2022 the now infamous data breach left millions of customers with a bitter taste when their personal details were leaked on the dark web.
Nearly 10 million Australians had their personal data exposed in the foreign entity hack with 2.8 million impacted with passport, driver's licence and Medicare numbers exposed.
Those details were sold on the dark web.
Following the hack, more than 100,000 aggrieved current and former Optus customers launched a class action lawsuit against the telco.
