John Linton We finalised our 'NBN2' plans for Armidale, Kiama and Willunga yesterday and will advise the Exetel customers who are able to get fibre connections in those areas via email before the end of this week. We have had little success with fibre to date with the possible exception of the Telstra service in Point Cook on the outskirts of Melbourne where, based on Telstra's estimated numbers of connectable houses we achieved a 'market share' of almost 5% of the total - far higher than our overall ADSL market share of a little more than 1%. However in the 'NBN2' sites in Tasmania and the independently fibred 'green fields' estates the take up, at least with Exetel, is miniscule to the point we need to rethink whether we continue with those expenses.
The actual 'real' (as opposed to trial) NBNCo connections in the three towns currently available for 'testing' are due to be available from October 31st 2011. Prior to that date the ISP 'trial' participants are being offered the opportunity of offering their own customers the ability to enjoy a free install and no payments for ports or back hauls from 'now' to September 30th. The way Exetel has decided to make use of this offer is to send an email to all our customers who, at least in theory, can connect to the 'NBN2' on the basis that they can trial fibre at no charge from the time it is installed in their premises until 30th September.
Up to 30th September they will still pay for their ADSL connection at the current charges for thei selected plan. Before September 30th they must decide whether they wish to swap over to the fibre service (at the same monthly cost as they are paying for the ADSL service) in which case they cancel the ADSL service or if they don't want to do that then the fibre service will be turned off. Seems a reasonable, some might say generous, offer from NBNCo but then they are using tax payer money to fund it so it really only affects you and me in terms of cost recovery.
If I was an ADSL user in Armidale I would have no hesitation in taking part in this trial because I could determine, at no cost, whether a fibre service provided me with any measurable benefits compared to my ADSL service. If other ISPs make the pricing of the post September 30th fibre service the same (or lower) than their current price of an ADSL service and it is faster then why wouldn't anyone change to fibre? Of course the major factor in offering the same price, or lower, for fibre in these locations is the charge that NBNCo will make for the service which, as it stands, is much too high compared to Optus (who can't offer an ADSL service to these locations so is irrelevent) but as these towns are only serviced by Telstra then the fibre costs are lower than Exetel pays for an ADSL service there.
Currently, at least as far as I can see from the public record, NBNCo is charging (ex GST) $24.00 per month for the port and another $20.00 per mbps per month for the CVC connectivity from the local exchange to the residence. On top of that there is a back haul cost from the NBNCo's hand off to the ISP's POI. These costs are far higher than in any State capital city than Optus charges Exetel but, depending on the back haul cost (currently NBNCo is using a Sydney and Adelaide CBD hand off for the trials) the cost of a fibre connection in these locations is currently lower than that charged by Telstra Wholesale to Exetel. Back of a bus ticket qad calcualtion seems to indicate that NBNCo would charge Exetel around up to $10.00 less for a fibre connection than we are currently being charged by Telstra. That is for the lowest fibre speed - 100 mbps connections would obviously be much more expensive than current ADSL services.
So we need to put some NBNCo fibre pricing on our web site before very long but we can't do that until we determine back haul costs outside the capital cities and get a clearer set of time frames from NBNCo about their time lines for activation of POIs in the various locations. As you would expect from a government monopoly there appears to be no desire to use the technological advantages of fibre to do more than meet Telstra's current pricing minus a small percentage which, unless I'm completely wrong in that view, will make a fibre connection in a country town a line ball decision in terms of cost versus ADSL and much more expensive in terms of the large cities - which, of course, have over 80% of all broadband users.
Of course, if you want to take a really pessimistic view then you can accept twaddle like this:
http://www.itwire.com/business-it-news/networking/48287-atug-chairman-details-the-devil-in-the-detail-of-nbn-implementation
If there is anything of less value than the words of a politician it is the words of a superannuated pontificator with no 'skin in the game'.
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21 - The old voting age which Bob Brown now wants to reduce from 18 to 16. You have to wonder whether he has ever met a 16 year old.