Optic Security Group: ten companies entered administration. Bemac holds $17.26 million of live Commonwealth contracts.

Correction and update — 26 October 2026: An earlier version of this article named Matthew Levesque-Hocking and Barry Taylor as joint appointees, based on ASIC’s original appointment notice. ASIC published an amended notice on 26 October naming Todd Gammel without those additional appointees. The article has been corrected. This update also adds a second Northern Territory hospital contract and a registered employee agreement. The Commonwealth-contract total remains the 22 October calculation while later amendments are reconciled.

On 5 October 2026, a new Department of Home Affairs contract began: a $2.64 million refresh of CCTV hardware, running to June 2027.

The supplier named on it is not Optic Security Group. It is Bemac Security Pty. Limited, ACN 003 482 577, the company that holds the business names Optic Security Group NSW and Optic Security Group ACT.

Sixteen days later, on 21 October 2026, voluntary administrators were appointed to Bemac and nine other Optic companies. ASIC published the original appointment notice on 23 October. An amended notice published on 26 October names Todd Gammel of HLB Mann Judd as administrator, without the additional joint appointees named in the earlier version.

Is Optic Security Group in administration? Ten Australian companies behind the Optic Security Group name are. "Optic Security Group" itself is a trading name, not a company. Which Optic company a customer, agency or supplier dealt with depends on the state and the paperwork. Administration is not liquidation: the administrators take control, and creditors vote on the companies' future at a later meeting.

Optic Security Group was assembled in 2018 by combining security businesses in Australia and New Zealand. In Australia, its name is spread across separate companies, most of them registered under other names.

All of those Optic business names were registered on 13 July 2020. The plainest version, "Optic Security Group", is held by the South Australian company.

One more name matters. IP Australia's register records the "Optic Security" trade mark as owned by Optic Security Group Limited. That is the name of the New Zealand company that sat at the top of the group until 2022. It is not among the ten companies in the administration notice, and, as the ownership section below shows, that New Zealand company no longer exists.

Bemac’s federal work has mostly been for Home Affairs, the former Customs service and the Australian Federal Police. On 22 October, ten of its Commonwealth contracts still had end dates ahead of them. Their combined published value in The Open Register’s 22 October extraction was about $17.26 million. Later amendments may change that figure; the ten-contract total has not been replaced pending a complete reconciliation.

The largest are:

The NT company has government work of its own. Security & Technology Services (NT), trading as Optic Security Group NT, holds a federal police alarm-systems contract to June 2027. The Northern Territory Government's tenders portal lists it as the winner of a 36-month contract to maintain the nurse-call systems at Royal Darwin and Palmerston hospitals, with an award date of 1 July 2025 and estimated rates totalling $865,408.

These are published contract values. They are not amounts paid, money owed or revenue. As at 26 October, no agency had publicly said what the administration means for its work, and no contract had been reported as ended.

For contracts made since 1 July 2018, the Corporations Act generally stops the other party ending a contract only because the company entered administration. There are exceptions. While the administration lasts, the administrators control the companies' business.

Further public records identify additional work associated with the Optic Security name, including hospital security-system maintenance, and a registered electrical workers’ agreement.

Security & Technology Services (NT) Pty Ltd, ACN 110 544 753, also won a Northern Territory Government contract valued at an estimated $2,246,126 to service CCTV, access-control and engineering ICT systems at Royal Darwin and Palmerston hospitals.

Tender T23-1480 was awarded on 24 May 2024 for a 12-month period. It is separate from the $865,407.65 nurse-call maintenance contract described above, which was awarded in July 2025 for 36 months.

The earlier CCTV contract establishes additional hospital work by the same legal company. Its published term does not establish that the work continued into the October 2026 administration. Neither award establishes that Optic owns the hospitals’ installed equipment.

The Fair Work Commission’s 2026 register lists the Optic Security Group NSW and ETU Electrical Contracting Enterprise Agreement 2025–2029, approved on 2 April 2026 under agreement number AE532403. Its nominal expiry is 31 March 2029.

This establishes a registered industrial agreement associated with the Optic Security Group NSW name. It does not, by itself, establish which of the ten companies employs each affected worker, whether any employee entitlements are unpaid, or what employees might recover through an administration. Employees should identify the legal employer on their payslip or employment contract and check whether the agreement applies to them.

Source: Fair Work Commission 2026 agreement index, page 26.

The administrators’ appointment does not itself establish that any hospital, police or Commonwealth security service has stopped. The public contract records do not disclose whether an agency has consented to a transfer, arranged replacement services, varied the contract or continued working with the administrators.

The distinction matters: a published contract value describes the agreed procurement, not revenue earned or money available to creditors.

For eight of the ten companies, this is the first appointment. Two have been here before.

A deed of company arrangement is a binding deal between a company and its creditors, used as an alternative to liquidation. The published notices do not show whether the 2024 variation was approved, or whether either deed was completed.

Part of the Australian group was built by buying a Darwin business.

In November 2018, Optic Security Australia 2 bought all the shares in Security & Technology Services (NT) and five related companies. The purchase was part of a trans-Tasman consolidation the buyers called Project Malibu. The price was paid 52% in cash and 48% in shares. It was set by a formula: the businesses' forecast earnings for 2018-19 multiplied by 5.5.

Optic Security Australia 2 later sued the seller, YC Investments (NT) Pty Ltd. It claimed the forecasts behind the price had overstated the expected margin on a subcontract at RAAF Base Tindal in the Northern Territory.

On 19 May 2023, the Federal Court dismissed that claim. The judge found the warranty claim had been brought too late under the sale agreement, and said it would have dismissed the claim on its merits in any event.

The seller had its own claim, for money it said was still owed from the purchase price. The court allowed it. Optic Security Australia 2 was ordered to pay the seller $1.35 million, plus interest and costs.

Ninety-one days after the judgment, on 18 August 2023, Optic Security Australia 2 entered administration. The judgment and the appointment are separate public records, and no public document connects them.

The group’s change of hands in 2022 went through a receivership of its New Zealand parent. That proceeding was separate from the Australian companies’ 2021 and 2023 administrations and the ten-company Australian administration that began in October 2026.

The 2023 judgment describes the parent of the Australian purchasing company as Optic Security Group Limited, a New Zealand company. On 17 October 2022, at the company's request, Bank of New Zealand appointed receivers from Calibre Partners to it. Its directors appointed administrators from Grant Thornton the same day. The liquidators later reported that the directors had resolved the company was insolvent after "an extended unsuccessful business sales campaign".

On 4 November 2022, the receivers signed an agreement selling the shares in Optic Security Finance Group Limited, the company that owned the group's trading companies, to Frosh Private Equity Limited. The receivers describe the buyer as "a related party of the mezzanine debt provider to the Group", and the liquidators list that lender as Arena Optic Security Investor SPV. The sale settled on 17 November 2022. The trading companies were not in receivership and kept trading.

That month, trade press reported that an affiliate of the US investment firm Arena Investors had acquired Optic's operating businesses. The 2023 judgment records that Arena had also provided finance to the buyers in 2018, although it was not a party to that purchase.

The receivers' reports set out what the sale did to the debt. The New Zealand parent had guaranteed NZ$84.9 million of senior and mezzanine lending. The sale cut that by NZ$58.5 million and repaid the senior lenders in full. In June 2024, NZ$26.3 million was still owed to the mezzanine lender, which had received NZ$117,678 from the receivership. Unsecured creditors received nothing.

The parent went into liquidation on 28 November 2022. The liquidation was completed on 6 September 2024, and the company was removed from the New Zealand register on 9 October 2024. Its name is still recorded as the owner of the "Optic Security" trade mark in Australia.

Who owns the ten Australian companies now is not shown on any free public register. Five other New Zealand companies with Optic Security in their names were still registered when checked on 24 October, with no insolvency status shown. Optic's website carried no statement about the administration on 23 October.

If your business deals with Optic Security Group, start with the company name and ACN on your contract, purchase order or invoice, not the Optic name.

The registered business names are a guide to where to look, not proof. Optic Security Group NSW and ACT are registered to Bemac Security. The SA and VIC names are registered to Security & Technology Services (SA). The QLD names are with the SQ company, the WA names with the Norwest company, Optic Security Group NT with the NT company and Optic Security Group Central with the Central company.

Each of the ten companies has its own creditors. A debt is owed by the company named on the paperwork. Proofs of debt and proxies are due with the administrators by 5pm on 30 October. The first meeting of creditors is at 11am on 2 November at HLB Mann Judd in Sydney, with online attendance available.

The Open Register reports public records, not advice. This article does not establish the companies' financial position, why they entered administration, or the outcome for any contract, creditor or employee.