Optus’ head of network operations has resigned four months after a widespread outage at the telecommunications giant disrupted the lives of millions of Australians.
In a statement, the embattled telco confirmed that Lambo Kanagaratnam, CEO of the Optus network, had left the company on Friday.
His departure marks the second high-level executive to leave the company following the Nov. 8 blackout that affected about 10 million customers and about 400,000 businesses.
Former CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin left the telecommunications company on November 20.
Acting CEO Michael Venter said he had “the utmost respect” for his capabilities and his service to Optus, Australia’s second-largest telecommunications provider.
“Personally, I have the greatest respect for Lambo as someone who consistently demonstrates the characteristics we all know him for,” he said in a message sent to Optus staff.
‘He is calm under pressure, approachable, cares deeply about our people and our business and is always professional.
‘Under his leadership, Optus Network has been Australia’s fastest 5G network for over three years and now has over 4,000 5G sites across Australia.
In a statement, the telco confirmed that Lambo Kanagaratnam, CEO of the Optus network, had left the company on Friday.
‘He led the acquisition of 25MHz of 900MHz in late 2021 to address Optus’ low-band spectrum shortfall, which this year will deliver a significantly improved customer experience, as well as bringing our 5G footprint to a larger customer base.
‘He was a key member of the team that completed the sale of the ATN tower portfolio for $1.9 billion in 2021.
“And looking ahead, our partnership with SpaceX to cover 100 per cent of Australia will be a game-changer for Optus and our customers.”
The Optus website states that Kanagaratnam has spent more than 24 years in the telecommunications sector.
Prior to joining Optus, Kanagaratnam held a number of senior positions over a 15-year period at telecommunications company MTN in Africa and the Middle East.
Optus is recovering from two serious breakdowns.
In 2022, the company suffered a serious data breach in a cyberattack and on November 8, 2023, a day-long crisis left millions offline, paralyzing businesses and emergency services.
Kanagaratnam’s departure marks the second high-level executive to leave the company following the Nov. 8 blackout that affected about 10 million customers and about 400,000 businesses.
South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas threatened to withdraw the company’s contracts due to the blackout.
“They have let down their customers across the state, including the government,” he said that day.
“And Optus needs to respond quickly, communicate effectively with everyone about exactly what is happening here.”
Malinauskas said his government would consider switching suppliers after first putting out the day’s fires.
“If Optus wants to pursue the government as a customer, it needs to be a reliable service in this modern era,” he said.
‘Telecommunications are fundamental to the function of government.
‘We have a contract with Optus, as do other governments across the country. “That’s something we will focus on.”
Optus attributed the failure to changes in “routing information” following a routine update of its systems.
“At around 4.05am on Wednesday, the Optus network received changes to the routing information of an international peering network (Singtel Internet Exchange) following a routine software update,” Optus said in a statement last year. past.
“There were changes to routing information that propagated through multiple layers in our network and exceeded pre-established security levels on key routers that could not handle them.”
The statement says the action resulted in the routers being disconnected from the Optus IP Core network to protect themselves.