[LINK] One gigabit on NBN

[stephen at melbpc.org.au]

One gigabit available on NBN this month

December 6, 2013. By Lucy Battersby
<http://www.smh.com.au/it-pro/one-gigabit-available-on-nbn-this-month-
20131206-hv4pg.html>


NBN Co will start selling a one gigabit per second (1Gbps) broadband 
service before the end of the year, but availability will depend on the 
number of people willing to pay for the super fast speeds. 

The commercial-grade broadband service will travel at download speeds of up 
to 1000 megabits per second [Mbps], also known as a gigabit, and upload 
speeds of 400 Mbps. This is about 100 times faster than the average speeds 
available to most households on the copper network today. 

An NBN Co spokesman confirmed on Friday the service "will be made available 
to retail service providers by the end of the year", but that it was up to 
retail service providers to decide whether they would sell it to customers. 

There were currently about 250,000 households and businesses within NBN 
Co’s fibre footprint that could potentially request the service. 

At least one carrier has already confirmed it would sell 1 Gbps plans, but 
none of the retail providers contacted by Fairfax Media on Friday would 
reveal their prices.

“Our plans to launch a gigabit service are still being finalised, but we 
will add it to our offering,’’ iiNet’s NBN product manager, Rachael 
McIntyre, said. iiNet also owns TransACT and Internode.  

It may be some time before consumers know how much 1 Gbps would cost 
because NBN Co charges its wholesale customers – the retailers that sell 
services to consumers – a basic monthly access charge for each active 
connection plus a ‘‘CVC charge’’. 

The CVC charge pays for the speed and capacity NBN Co supplies to each 
retailer’s customers within a fibre serving area. Charges increase as 
consumers request faster services. 

For example, the wholesale cost of buying 100 Mbps from NBN Co was $38 per 
month per premise for access, plus $2000 per area per month for the speed. 
Supplying 1 Gbps would cost $150 per month for access, plus $20,000 for 
speed, according to NBN Co’s 2013-16 Draft Corporate Plan.   

Each carrier splits the cost among its customers in each area, usually 3000 
premises, figuring not all of them would require the maximum speed at 
exactly the same time. 

However, if only one premise out of 3000 wanted a 1 Gbps plan, that single 
household or business may be asked to pay the monthly $20,000 CVC charge, 
as Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull warned when he was in 
opposition. 

"The reality is this: if you want to have a guaranteed one gig service, 
your retail service provider will have to buy one gig of CVC for you and 
that is gonna cost $20,000 a month," he said during a pre-election NBN 
debate. 

Senior analyst at Informa Telecoms and Media, Tony Brown, said NBN Co’s 
wholesale charging model was still a concern for telcos and some were 
hoping NBN Co might change it under the new government. 

He expects the 1 Gbps service would be a ‘‘niche service’’ marketed to 
commercial customers, with only a handful of residential customers 
interested in it. 

"The issue for retailers is, it is such a huge amount of bandwidth. Do you 
want to risk putting all that bandwidth into the market place?" Mr Brown 
said. 

The 1Gbps service was first considered in 2010 and announced earlier this 
year.

In October, Google Fibre boss Kevin Lo said given access to 1Gbps services, 
consumers and entrepreneurs would "rise to that occasion".

Cheers,
Stephen
Loosley

Message sent using MelbPC WebMail Server