John Linton .....getting nearer what is already being delivered to 'live' customers in the EU.
I read this earlier this morning:
http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/353318/optus_scores_50mbps_sydney_lte_tests/?fp=4&fpid=5
and, as the article references, Telstra have already achieved higher sustainable speeds in their earlier trial in Victoria. Customers in two Scandinavian cities are already using 'live' LTE and that technology is expected to grow rapidly in use before the end of this year in the EU with some mobile providers electing to deploy 'fully compliant' 4G in their roll out of much higher speed wireless broadband. The same scenario is happening in the US with both Verizon and AT&T saying they will provide higher speeds via LTE/4G before the end of this calendar year.
Does this mean anything to Australian broadband users? Not really at this moment because these are only trials and the carriers concerned will need big capital budgets and a certain set of future projections on cost versus uptake before they commit to making LTE/4G speeds generally available in sensible chunks of Australia - but they are both giving solid indications that they will be going down the same paths as the Europeans and the Americans - which can only be good for Australians generally and those Australians that cannot get a decent broadband service and are unlikely to have a fibre alternative in the forseeable future.
It also raises the issue I (and I'm sure others) raised before the last election when the late and unlamented Rudd produced one of his 32 ridiculous (all subsequently 'broken') 'promises' of delivering a 12 mbps 'national' broadband wire line network for less than his back of a bus ticket calculated $A5 billion together with his then best buddy - Telstra (he simply 'forgot' to ask Telstra if they would go along with his stupidity). At the time I made the, what I thought was the eminently sensible, point that if $A5 billion was available to build a 'national' wire line network why not use it as 'loan capital' to speed up the deployment of LTE by the three mobile carriers in regional areas of Australia? Obviously anything that could have those words applied to it was not going to find favour with the lightweight megalomaniac that the Australian electorate subsequently inflicted upon themselves.
But, despite the various manipulations and massive increased estimate since those halcyon days almost three years ago this morning's article simply serves to underline what was always obvious - long before the first customers are connected to Rudd's Folly (at enormous expense to the taxpayer) faster speed at lower cost broadband will be provided by the commercial carriers who, being in competition with each other, will ensure at least a duopoly which should be better that a government monopoly in providing fast broadband services in regional and country Australia.....with no cost to the taxpayer.
As things currently stand Australians will have a choice between a government monopoly (think Telecom Australia and the prices it used to charge) offering wholesale fibre connectivity and two, possibly three, commercial wireless networks offering similar or better speeds at less cost and with no installation costs for the service and no 'monthly access' charges to repay a huge debt. There are a great many other factors than the simplified scenario described in a few words above but the reality is that both Telstra and Optus future is dependent on them replacing the lost wire line telephone and broadband revenues (and profits) with a wireless based technology and, unless I have completely misunderstood the realities, they have enormous financial incentives to do exactly that...which means...
.......that the two companies who, between them, control over 75% of all services provided to residential end users and who control the wireless networks around Australia will now see exactly how they transfer the vast majority of their current wire line telephone and data residential customers to a wireless alternative network that they own and depend upon for their future.It's something that is uppermost in my mind as we re-consider just what can be done (by Exetel) in re-framing our wireless broadband offerings later today and over the weekend.
Does anyone with five minutes of experience in the Australian communications industry see it any other way? Am I the only business/residential communications user in the country who long ago gave up using a wire line telephone or data service? Does anyone really think that Optus and Telstra have any interest in putting customers on a fibre network owned by someone else rather than a wireless network owned by themselves? Is Father Christmas early this year and have the fairies at the bottom of the garden increased in numbers and visibility?
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