Aussie Broadband's Symbio unit under scrutiny after Vodafone scam call claim
Symbio, bought by Aussie Broadband for $262 million in 2023, contributes about 17 per cent of group revenue and is now in the spotlight after Vodafone accused it of carrying 98 per cent of 24.8 million scam calls to its customers.
Vodafone has accused Aussie Broadband's Symbio business of being responsible for 98 per cent of 24.8 million scam calls made to Vodafone customers over 12 months, Rampart reported. The claim, made last month, has put a spotlight on an acquisition that Aussie Broadband pitched as a way to move beyond reselling the National Broadband Network.
Aussie struck a $262 million cash and scrip deal to buy the communications-as-a-service company in November 2023. Founder Phillip Britt said at the time that the company had been impressed by Symbio's team and culture, which he said were well aligned with Aussie's. He promised the deal would be earnings-per-share accretive in the first year and would help diversify Aussie away from being just an NBN reseller. Britt stood down from the Aussie board in March, ending his association with the company he founded with John Reisinger in 2003.
Aussie no longer breaks out Symbio's contribution, but past disclosures suggest it brought in close to $220 million a year in revenue in financial 2026, at a gross margin of a little under 50 per cent. That is about 17 per cent of Aussie's total revenue of $1.3 billion for the year. Gross margin is Aussie's preferred divisional measure, calculated as revenue less network and hardware expenses, and excluding staff and other corporate costs.
Symbio specialises in hosting phone services for wholesalers and large businesses, including numbers used to dial into Zoom or Microsoft Teams meetings. Enterprise customers can buy thousands of numbers at a time, and Aussie hosts more than 8.3 million through Symbio and Netsip, a similar but far smaller business it owns.