New Optus CEO Stephen Rue says he saw the role as a “huge opportunity” when he accepted the position at the embattled telco in the wake of a serious data breach and major outage.
Rue appeared as a special guest for Episode 696 of the Two Blokes Talking Tech podcast with Tech Guide editor Stephen Fenech and EFTM’s Trevor Long.
The hour-long exclusive interview with the new Optus boss and former NBN CEO covered a range of topics including taking the reins of the company following two major incidents, the changes he has made, the future of the network, the role of AI and what skills and policies he brought to Optus from his time as chairman of the Melbourne Storm NRL team.
Stephen and Trevor asked to interview Rue’s predecessor Kelly Bayer Rosmarin but were refused access of any kind.
This interview with Stephen Rue was conducted at the Optus offices in Macquarie Park and there was nothing we were told was off limits to ask him and we were NOT asked to supply our questions in advance.
Rue said he didn’t view accepting the role as Optus CEO as a challenge.
“I saw it as a huge opportunity actually. And I mean that genuinely, a lot of people say challenge is opportunities. I saw it as, as a real opportunity,” he said.
“I’ve been in the telco industry for 10 years when I am at NBN six as the chief executive.
“I realized how important telecommunication services are to people.
“What does a telco provide for people? It provides health, it provides education. People can run businesses, people can connect with families, and people in regional rural Australia.”
Rue said security was obviously an important tentpole for the company especially after massive data breach in September 2022.
And he made significant changes to improve the security of the business.
“That’s the challenge with security. The world moves on and you’ve just got to make sure that it’s at the forefront of what you think, what you do, that you’ve got the right structures and processes and capabilities,” Rue said.
“It’s important for the infrastructure of Australia. It’s obviously important for our own business as well.
“So work, never, ever, ever finishes. One of the things that I’ve done is, is appoint a new chief security and risk officer who’s a very experienced person in the industry and have him directly report to me.”
But the outage in November 2023 was not a security issues but an operational issue and Rue says the Optus network has made major investments to be more resilient.
“There, there was changes implemented in terms of obviously new personnel and we’ve got a new CTO who’s very experienced,” he said.
“We have made sure that we’ve invested in the areas that we need to invest in.
“But it never stops. You’ve got to make sure your, your single points of failure, your network and your IT systems, in fact are, are completely resilient.
“Investing in the areas that matter and that has been happening and continues to happen.”
Rue says Optus has increased its subscriber base and profits in the past year.
“We grew up subscribers and our financials grew last year,” he said.
“I want them to be obviously much better going forward. But we did grow a subscriber base and we did have more than 50 per cent growth in earnings last year.
“But we we’re going to be better. Again, we need to be, and we will be.”
Rue was chairman of the Melbourne Storm and enjoyed the community feel of the club.
“My happiest moment at the Storm games were dressing sheds afterwards when the wives and girlfriends and kids would come into the sheds,” he said.
“What the storm had built and what the salary cap challenges helped them build even more was a real family, a family feel around the club and a real community.
“A lot of the players’ wives and girlfriends had actually a lot to do with rebuilding the club.
“I say this to Craig (Bellamy) all the time, you’ve taught me a lot.
“And he doesn’t quite believe me, but he, the team building that they do, the clear accountability but clear support for people.
“Clear team building is something that I’ve carried through.”
You can hear and watch the entire interview through the YouTube link above or the audio player below.
