Thursday, December 31. 2009The End Of Exetel's Sixth Year......John Linton .......easily the most 'successful' in our short 'history'. With less than 24 hours to go until 2010 gets under way we only have a few odds and ends to tidy up to ensure we are completely organised to try and get the most out of the 'dead' month of January having completed our best December since we began in business. It isn't just the various revenue and customer growth figures that have made 2009, and especially December, so satisfying but the overall development of the company in many different and very important ways. I imagine that when anyone starts up a business they have high hopes for its success and for those businesses that actually survive it must give their founders some considerable satisfaction in overcoming all the statistical odds that indicate that less than 5% of businesses that are started last beyond five years. So I should, as part of the 'start up' team that created Exetel be feeling very satisfied this morning with our achievements over the past six years - and I am - but not as much as I thought I would.....mainly because I think that 2010 will be a very, very difficult year for Exetel. Some of the most satisfying things are the very real achievements of: 1) Having 5 of the first six people who started with Exetel still employed and at much more senior levels 2) Having more than 500 of our first 1,000 customers still using our services. 3) Never having borrowed one cent to grow our business - we paid cash for everything we needed 4) Not owing a cent to any supplier who has submitted an invoice more than seven days ago 5) Still doing (immensely more) business with the five main suppliers we started with and, as I touched on in a previous musing, the development of a national 6 gbps network across 8 Australian PoPs, the successful set up of a 'bigger' company than Exetel Australia in Sri Lanka and contributing closing on $A1 million to the protection of endangered Australian animals, birds and plants are all 'achievements' that give a great deal of personal satisfaction - particularly as these achievements have been made while providing services to Australian individuals and businesses at much lower prices than any other, much longer established and much bigger, data communications supplier has done and is doing - and in constantly achieving that paramount objective of starting Exetel - I think we all get a great sense of not wasting our last six years. So, undoubtedly, we will all in our different ways take some small amount of time today to reflect on the ups and downs, and there have been many downs over the last six years, of trying to deliver a constantly growing number of data and telephony services to a constantly growing number of customers while striving to achieve our three key company goals and hopefully we will 'dwell on' the ups rather than the downs. Without our long term customers we wouldn't be in business today so, to those of you reading today's musing who are Exetel customers - thank you for helping us survive and grow - your support is the only reason we are still in business. PS: If you want to put Exetel's donation programs in to perspective (where our directors take their own time to seek out community based projects and then send the money monthly while insisting on quarterly audits and visiting the projects to review progress first hand) make yourself very angry by reading this link sent to me a few moments ago: http://www.news.com.au/business/cancer-charity-onlybrgives-away-4900/story-e6frfm1i-1225814275430
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From one of 500+ still with you, thanks for running a great service!
p.s. I hope something is done about that cancer "research" foundation! That's criminal. Comment (1)
Congratulations, I can still remember when the first POP went online and my one and only call to support in the first month when I think there was yourself and one other taking the calls. You have come a long way since then and its a great testament to hard work and good staff.
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Thank you - I have always remembered your nick name and was so pleased to see that you signed up with us again after your returned from Spain.
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Dear John,
I don't have an Exetel service, but I read your blog each and every day, I can't use ADSL2 as I have a dodgy phone line and can only use cable. Please can you re-think your position, as I will really miss your daily witings Happy New Year Laurence Comment (1)
I was with Exetel in the early days and now -- after you guys have been going strong for six years -- it may be time for the other ISP fanbois to eat humble pie for stating you guys wouldn't last a year at those prices.
Unless i am mistaken -- it was Exetel that first introduced excess GB's at an extremely affordable rate, with others following suit. Keep up the good work - if you guys had premium usenet, i'd be back over in a flash. Comment (1)
I think JL might have done it first at Swiftel. I vaguely remember a forum post asking why so cheap compared to Telstra etc ($3 compared to $150+).
I believe the answer was 'well it is a 100% markup'. Correct me if I'm wrong.. Comment (1)
At Swiftel we introduced $5.00 per gb when, as you say, Telstra was charging $150.00.
At Exetel we started at $4.00, then $3.00 and now $0.50. Comments (3)
That link is wrong.
It's not a charity. It's a scam. Give them money and they waste it. 1%!! Comment (1)
Unfortunately I have only just found your blog a month ago. I was mindlessly surfing the web, killing time while stuck in a hospital bed for a few weeks.
I find it a great read and an insight into the workings of an ISP. I followed your musings while you were at Swiftel and even bought shares in the company as it started to grow (wish I had sold them soon after though...). I swapped to Exetel not long after it started and continued to use them till about 18 months ago when ADSL could not provide the upload speeds I was after. Exetel was not able to provide ADSL2+ at Hammersly Exchange (HAMS), so I reluctantly moved to Amnet (their ok). I would love to re-join Exetel as I was happy with the service and think the package of extras they provide is really worthwhile. I keep checking every few months with Exetel Sales to see if they can tell me when HAMS will be equipped with ADSL2+, but there still is no word. I understand how long it must take you to provide a blog each day. Blogging when you feel like it is a good compromise, but please don't block non Exetel IP's from following your wise thoughts. Peter. PS I would like it to be law for all registered charities to have to publish 6 monthly the amount of overhead they skim off donations recieved. There are way to many sharks out there lining their own pockets. Comment (1)
Don't know whether im in that 1000, but i joined in mid 2005 and I'm still here . Keep up the good work John.
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