By Kishor Napier-Raman and Noel Towell
Things continue to go from worse to much worse for troubled Aussie tech outfit Nuix, which gave investors a glimpse on Monday of the horrors to come when its full-year results are revealed next month via webinar with chief executive Jonathan Rubinsztein.
Revenue, contract values and before tax profits are all tipped to be heading south with statutory revenue likely to be between $151 million and $154 million, down from $165 million in 2020-21. Statutory earnings before tax plunged from more than $30 million in FY 21 to just $12 million at most in FY22.
Sharing the bad news: Jonathan Rubinsztein, CEO of Nuix.Credit: Louise Kennerley
The share price hit an all-time low of $0.64 on Monday.
It looks like the only people making money from Nuix are its lawyers, with “non-operational” legal costs during the financial year likely to top $14 million.
Not surprising when you consider Nuix was raided last year by federal police pursuing allegations of insider trading, is being sued in at least two class actions by shareholders alleging they were misled on revenue forecasts and then there’s the case before the federal court, where former CEO Eddie Sheehy is suing over up to $183 million in share proceeds.
Spare a thought too for clients of Australian Ethical Investments. The $29 million of members’ money the fund has plunged into Nuix since June last year was worth about $10.3 million at lunchtime.
Wade’s World
Deloitte partner Janey Kuzma bravely took to social media to announce the consulting giant’s appointment of former attorney-general Michaelia Cash’s hardline industrial relations adviser Wade O’Grady to its workplace integrity team.
Ever one with an eye to his future, the firm’s newest recruit admits he “watched with keen interest the growth of Deloitte’s workplace integrity team over the past four years”.
A loyal Liberal Party member and associate of right faction leader Michael Sukkar, O’Grady says he is well experienced in workplace integrity after having responsibility in Cash’s office for “tribunal and statutory appointments”.
CBD wonders if this included the re-appointment, on O’Grady’s watch, of controversial former right Senator Karen Synon to a new $496,000-per-annum five year term on the Administrative Appeals Tribunal without an interview ahead of her term expiring in 2023. And then there’s the promotion of proven underperformer and failed Liberal preselection candidate Rachel Westaway to a $390,000 per-annum five-year senior member post on Synon’s recommendation?
We asked Wade if he was involved in those appointments. We didn’t get an answer.
But those jobs sure look like workplace integrity at its finest.
AZ you were
The 47th Parliament kicks off next week, but senior ministers are still scrambling to finalise their staff.
Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen has picked up Joanne Cleary, most recently chief spinner for Seqirus – and every health journo’s favourite point person for all things AstraZeneca.
After stints working for shadow ministers Kate Ellis, Catherine King and former opposition leader Bill Shorten, she’s returning to politics in a strategic communications role. We’re sure that handling the messaging around Labor’s climate policy will be a cinch compared to spinning the rocky rollout of the AZ jab.
Also joining the new Labor government is Nick Butterly, who has signed up to work for Resources Minister Madeleine King.
Butterly spent more than a decade in Canberra working for News Corp, AAP and (mostly) the West Australian but – along with wife and former Fin Review scribe Sophie Morris – left the cold capital a few years ago for the warmer climes of his home town, Perth.
Meanwhile, Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek has hired Tamsin Lloyd, formerly of the Asbestos Safety and Eradication Agency, and the Australian Metal Workers Union, as communications director. Lloyd’s husband, Daniel Mookhey, is NSW Labor’s Shadow Treasurer – perhaps another rising political power couple to watch.
Blue and green
It isn’t just Labor frontbenchers hiring up.
Across the aisle, veteran politico Adrian Barrett has joined Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s office as a press secretary alongside long-term spinner Nicole Chant after a career that included stints with Tony Abbott, and as chief of staff to Andrew Hastie.
Over in teal land, the expanded crossbench are doing what they can following Anthony Albanese’s decision to cut their staffing allocations. Wentworth MP Allegra Spender’s team has a distinctly British flavour, (only natural given her electorate includes the expat hub of Bondi) with community engagement management Kath Naish and policy adviser Joe Fowles, both from the UK, getting permanent roles following their work on the campaign.
Spender’s still advertising for a media and comms co-ordinator, an operations co-ordinator and a head of policy. But unlike her fellow teal, Kooyong MP Monique Ryan, she doesn’t seem to be insisting that new hires sign a “confidentiality agreement”.
Meanwhile, five years after being ousted from the top of the Greens’ NSW Senate ticket, Lee Rhiannon is returning to Canberra ... in a genealogical sense. The former Senator’s daughter Kilty O’Gorman is office manager to David Shoebrige, the political party’s newest lower house member for NSW.
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