It’s been a week of high profile departures, with the CEOs of both NBN Co and the Australian Cyber Security Growth Network (AustCyber) calling it quits.
NBN Co CEO Bill Morrow announced on 4 April that he’ll be leaving NBN at the end of this year, at which time he will have notched up almost 5 years at the helm.
Morrow said in a statement that the time had come to hand over control of Australia’s national broadband network.
“I believe that as the company prepares to confront the new challenges ahead, this is the right time to hand over the reins for the next phase of this incredible project and for me to plan for the next step in my career.”
In his time as the head NBN Co, Morrow has been besieged by customer complaints, with the ACCC announcing an inquiry into NBN wholesale service standards after more than 27,000 complaints were received about poor performance, and which ultimately forced various telcos to refund thousands of customers.
One of Morrow’s drivers has been to cement NBN Co in profitability. In February, the company announced a six-monthly revenue of $891 million for the period ending 31 December 2017, adding it was well on track to connect all Australian households to the NBN by 2020.
Prior to his NBN stint, Morrow served as CEO of Vodafone Hutchison Australia. Previous to this, he held senior positions in companies based in San Francisco and Japan.
The lengthy notice time gives the NBN Co Board plenty of time to conduct an international search for Morrow’s replacement.
Michelle Price, new CEO of AustCyber
This differed to Craig Davies’ departure from AustCyber, which was announced with immediate effect last Wednesday.
The outgoing CEO said that since the organisation began in January 2017, it had made incredible headway.
“We've helped many companies to think differently about their growth path, moved education in the right direction, negotiated agreements with the States and Territories to establish innovation nodes across the country and set out a plan to make Australia a global force in the cyber security market,” Davies said in a LinkedIn post.
Michelle Price, the former Chief Operating Officer at AustCyber, has been promoted to CEO.
“Very excited to be taking on the role of CEO at AustCyber,” Price said in a Tweet. “My sincere thanks to @crdavies for our first 12+ months of a nation-changing mission. I look forward to continuing our many partnerships across the economy and across the world to spread #ozcyber capability #gameon”
As for Davies, he plans on taking it easy in the foreseeable future.
“Right now, I'm looking forward to a break and spending a lot of time on my boat,” he told Information Age. “No plans beyond sailing for a while.”
