Administrators take control of national childcare chain

Staff at a struggling national chain of childcare centres have been warned of an “uncertain” and “challenging” future after the company was taken over by administrators.

Genius Learning – the company behind the Genius brand that runs seven centres in and around Melbourne and which was planning to open eight more – was being pursued through the courts for multimillion-dollar debts owed to landlords, the Tax Office and Victoria’s State Revenue Office. The wider national group also owns centres in NSW, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia and the ACT.

Darren Misquitta, director of Genius childcare.

The move into administration comes after centres around Melbourne and interstate closed their doors either temporarily or permanently in recent weeks, with staff complaining they had been forced to turn to food banks for meals after their wages went unpaid.

Parents of children enrolled at the centres told The Age they had been unable to go to their own jobs as centres closed with less than a day’s notice.

Workers at the chain were told on Monday that their employer had been taken over by administrators, but there was little detail in a message sent to centre managers by Genius head office about what might come next.

“The administrator has taken control of the company to assess its financial position and explore possible paths forward,” the message read.

Sydney-based administrators WLP told The Age that they would try to minimise disruption for families with children at Genius centres and for the staff employed there.

“While the administrators examine the company’s financial position, they are focused on stabilising operations and limiting any further disruption of services to families across the country,” WLP said.

The company that has gone into administration controls only four of the Victorian Genius centres – at Newcomb, Mont Albert, Beaumaris and Reservoir – and another two that had not opened (at Eumemmerring and Cranbourne West).

Home that belongs to childcare entrepreneur Darren Misquitta whose business are crumbling as creditors chase him for multi-million debts.Credit: The Age

Other Genius centres in Melbourne – at Ashwood, Altona North and Taylors Lakes – are operated by other companies within the network of corporate interests controlled by Genius owner Darren Misquitta, whose current whereabouts is unknown.

Genius staff, who were asked, say they have not seen the entrepreneur since mid-2024. He has not responded to multiple attempts by The Age to contact him. The head of the United Workers’ Union – which is suing Misquitta and three of his companies for more than $7 million in allegedly unpaid superannuation – says the businessman has “disappeared from the face of the Earth”.

When The Age on Monday visited the Misquitta family home, a multimillion-dollar Toorak mansion owned by the businessman’s wife, the property was boarded-up and did not appear to be lived in.

Residents of the exclusive suburb said they had not seen the entrepreneur or his family for some time.

The company forced into administration, Vertical 4, was previously called Genius Learning, lists Misquitta as company director and secretary, and is registered to the Toorak Road address.

Last month, creditors of another Misquitta-controlled childcare company called Horizontal 1 were advised by liquidator Paul Vartelas that he believed Misquitta, as company director, had breached his statutory obligations by allowing the company to accrue debts while already insolvent.

“It is my view that the director breached his obligations … by allowing the company to trade while insolvent,” Vartelas wrote in a report to creditors that has also been lodged with the corporate regulator, the Australian Securities and Investments Commission.

“My investigations … are currently ongoing.”

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