What does the National Broadband Network mean for Australian businesses?
Much has been written about the National Broadband Network (NBN). Most has been written about how the NBN will affect us as consumers.
Here, the discussion is the business impact of the NBN based on the Business Case Summary document just released. Its implications for small business are significant and can be broken into three areas:
- Speed
- Ubiquitous Coverage
- Business Services
Speed
The speed of the NBN will rock! The 93 percent of the population served by the proposed fibre network will have peak speeds of up to 100Mbps initially and up to 1Gbps for large business.
With today’s ADSL2+ technologies the average customer may get around 10Mbps. This means that the NBN will be at least 10 times faster. As well as high speed broadband your phone calls will likely be free (or very close to free).
You can get free phone calls via Skype today– but you are unlikely to move your complete business to it. The current networks are not fast enough and don’t perform well under heavy usage to guarantee a quality service. European experience is that 30Mbps is needed for the likes of Skype will become ready for business grade usage. NBN delivers this and some more – so calls will run on top of the NBN and will be essentially free.
Speed will also mean that data services like video conferencing, cloud applications etc will perform well.
Ubiquitous Coverage
NBN aims to serve 1.3 million business premises (on top of 9.6 million residential premises). It has also planned for Greenfield developments such as new housing estates and business parks.
It achieves the coverage by laying out “fibre to the premise”. The Telstra copper line will be replaced with NBN fibre. A ‘box” somewhere in your residence or building will deliver the services. Into this box you will plug in phone systems, PC’s, televisions etc.
The nearest thing in the Australia today is the Optus Cable. The Optus Cable is Hybrid Fibre Coax (HFC) network that is capable of carrying broadband, voice and Pay TV. The Optus Cable delivers the service from the lamp post to the residence by a coaxial cable, whereas the NBN will do this via a fibre cable. The NBN will use the Telstra underground ducts also.
As all residences and businesses will be connected, it will be easier for you to connect at speed to your customers and trading partners.