Summary
| Country | Australia  |
|
| Population | 20,090,437 | |
| Population Density | 2 per sq/km | |
| Internet Connections | 5,980,000 | |
| Broadband Connections | 2,000,000 | |
| Broadband Adoption | 30% | |
| Broadband Growth | 25% (2005 forecast) | |
| Broadband, Population Accessible | 98% | |
| Minimum broadband speed | 256kbit (cable) | |
| Maximum broadband speed | 10mbit (cable) | |
| Minimum broadband cost (1GB download) | $29.95 per month (22.50 USD) | |
| Cost per mbit/sec per GB download per month (average) | $5.55 AUD (4.16 USD) | |
| Excess cost per MB (average) | 0.15 AUD (0.112 USD) | |
| Average download allowance | 12GB | |
| Connection Types | Cable, ADSL, Wireless (WiFi and WiMAX), Satellite, EVDO (CDMA) | |
| Large ISPs (over 100,000 subscribers) | 10 | |
| Government Regulation | Heavy. Copper network owned by Telstra which is 51% government owned |
Main Players Summary
| Company | Network Type | Description |
| Telstra | ADSL, HFC, ISDN, Satellite, EVDO | Telstra is the incumbent telephony company . The government retains a 51% ownership but has recently passed legislation to sell the remain stake. The legislation creates a AUD 2 billion fund to provide for rural and regional communications development including broadband. |
| Optus | DSL, HFC, satellite, Fibre | Optus arose during the first stage of opening the telecommunications market to competition. The carrier obtained it's license by buying the government satellite operator Aussat. Since then the company has built a HFC network in the main cities, provides DSL and fibre to business customers and DSL to consumers. Optus also owns a stake in the Southern Cross undersea cable. Optus has gone several change of hands. The most recent was the sale of by Cable and Wireless to Singtel |
| AAPT | DSL | AAPT is owned by New Zealand Telecom. The company leases access off Telstra but is expected to take advantage of of the unconditioned local loop service (ULLS) otherwise known as local loop unbundling (LLU) |
| Primus Telecom | DSL | Primus Telecom is the local subsidary of Primus Telecom a US NASDAQ listed telecommunications company. Primus Telecom leases access to the copper network off Telstra but is expected to take advantage of the unconditioned local loop service (ULLS) |
Government Telecommunications Statutory Bodies
| Body | Acronym | Description |
| Australian Communcations and Media Authority | ACMA | The ACMA is responsible for is responsible for the regulation of broadcasting, radiocommunications, telecommunications and online content. The body was formed from the amalgamation of Australian Communicatoins Authority and the Australian Broadcasting Authority. The ACMA is undertaking a review of VoIP based on a previously released discussion paper. |
| Australian Competition and Consumer Commission | ACCC | The ACCC is responsible for the adminstration of the 1974 Trade Practices Act and other related acts. The ACCC prime role is to promote competition and fair trade for the benefit of consumers, businesses and the community. ACCC is currently monitoring the compliance of Telstra with LLU and copper access undertakings. |
Quick Facts
- Australia has 2 million households connected with broadband-class Internet connection
- 25% of all households in Australia have broadband connections
- There are 40,000 new broadband connections each month
- Of the new connections, 40% are with Telstra, the partly government-owned telco
- ADSL is the most common broadband medium while cable is avaliable in some major cities and sattelite connections in regional areas.
Background
Australia has only recently emerged as a broadband power house after many long years in dial-up wilderness and high costs due to the control Telstra has over the countries telecommunications infrastructure. Telstra (formerly Telecom) is the former state-owned national telecom, which is now only 51% owned by the government with the remaining government held shares scheduled to be sold off within the next 2-3 years. Telstra own the only copper network in Australia and control a large part of the data backbone. Due to their ownership of local exchanges, Telstra are the only wholesaler of broadband products. Each and every ISP must deal with and purchase either DSLAM space, connectivity or network leasing from Telstra.
Telstra's own broadband retail arm is known as BigPond.
In Australia, broadband is defined as an 'always on' Internet connection with a minimum download capacity of 256KB. This download rate is often disputed as not being true 'broadband'.
Statistics
The following statistics are both from AusStats and many other sources that are not referenced.
- As of March 2005 there were a total of 5.98 Million Internet subscribers in Australia, with growth over the past 12 months of 4%.
- In the year to March 2005, the total number of broadband connections grew from 1.3M to 2M.
- Broadband connected homes represent 30% of the Internet connected homes
- A total of 25% of all households are broadband connected
- There are a total of 689 ISP's offering Internet connections in Australia
- Of these, 550 (or 80%) provide broadband ADSL connections
- 10 of these ISP's have 100,000 or more subscribers
- ADSL is the most common broadband access method with just over 70% of broadband conenctions being ADSL connections
{image: Figure 1: Total Internet subscribers in Australia (source AusStats: 8153.1 Internet Activity, Australia)
Connection Types
Hybrid Fibre Coax cable was first rolled out in the late 90s (as part of Telstra's PayTV move Foxtel) in Sydney with home broadband services being offered shortly after by Telstra (the original plans had a total of 100MB of downloads). Optus (wholly owned subsidiary of Singtel) also rolled out its own coax network (again for PayTV and to provide telephone connections). ADSL was broadly rolled out in 2003 and onwards and the infrastructure is dominated by Telstra. More recently a number of providers have rolled our their own wireless networks, including Telstra itself.
- Cable (primarily Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne metro areas)
- ADSL (256KB - 1500)
- Satellite (regional areas)
- Wireless (EVDO, WiFi/WiMax and FWA)
Speeds and Prices
All prices are in Australian dollars. 1AUD = 0.75USD. Uploads are usually not calculated in bandwidth allocations as well as data to and from other ISP users or ISP services. Many ISP's provide value added services such as FTP space, email, gaming servers and VoIP.
Whirlpool tracks the prices and services offered by over 400 ISPs on its website. Telstra is often the most expencive service with many other ISPs providing value offerings such as 20GB at 1500/512 for $49.95 per month. Pricing in regional areas is up to 20% more than in metro areas. The fastest plan on offer is a 2.5mbps/1mbps DSL plan from internode.
Cable
Both Telstra and Optus provide a broadband using their hybrid fibre coax networks. The cable broadband is often sold as a package with telephone and paytv. Both companies state the speed as uncapped (it therefore depends on the number of users online at the same time) with 10mbps downloads recorded and 128kbps up though international transfer speeds are often limited. Cable avaliability is limited to the metro areas (the two networks are parallel each other along the streets) of the 3 largest cities on the east coast.
Setup/Connection - $249 (includes modem)
Install turnaround time up to 14 days.
Telstra - 200MB monthly download allowance - $29.95 per month
Telstra - Unlimited (shaped) - $69.95 per month
Telstra - 20GB - $109.95 per month.
Excess data is priced at 15 cents per MB.
ADSL
There are numerous ADSL providers with a variety of offerings and value-add services (such as VoIP).
Setup/Connection - $130 to Telstra, $50 or more to ISP varying
Install turnaround time 1 day (switching providers) to 8 days (new connection)
| Company | Speed (downlink/uplink kbps) | Usage Caps | Price (AUD per month) |
| Telstra | 256/64 | 200MB | $29.95 |
| Telstra | 1500/512 | 500MB | %69.95 |
| Telstra | 256/64 | Unlimited (shaped) | $59.95 |
| Telstra | 512/128 | Unlimited (shaped) | $69.95 |
| Telstra | 1500/512 | Unlimited (shaped) | $99.95 |
| Telstra | 1500/512 | 20GB | $129.95 |
Excess traffic is charged at 15 cents per MB.
Wireless - EVDO
EVDO wireless broadband is provided over the Telstra CDMA network which is avaliable in all major capital cities and many regional areas. EVDO is a relatively new offering.
Setup - $200 (home based) or $300 (laptop)
Turnaround times are unknown, but Telstra quotes same-day connections. Speeds are either 256kb or 512kbps.
| Company | Speed (downlink/uplink kbps) | Usage Caps | Price (AUD per month) |
| Telstra | 256/128 | 200MB | $69.95 |
| Telstra | 256/128 | 1GB | $99.95 |
| Telstra | 512/256 | 400MB | $99.95 |
| Telstra | 512/256 | 1GB | $129.95 |
Exess data is charged at 30 cents per MB
Wireless - WiFi
A number of independant companies have rolled out WiFi network across larger cities and are now extending into regional areas. The rollouts began with smaller networks at airports and malls and have now extended to become metro networks.
Wireless - FWA
Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) was rolled out in Sydney in 2004 by Unwired. Unwired's offering uses Navini Networks' FWA technology. Currently, much of metropolitan Sydney is covered.
A second FWA operator iBurst provides wireless broadband using ArrayComm’s iBurst technology. iBurst has coverage in much of Metropolitan Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Newcaste, Wollongong, Gold Coast, Central Coast (NSW) and Canberra. iBurst sells access and modems through retail outlets such as Dick Smiths, Bing Lee and OzEmail.
Pricing of the plans is very similar to ADSL pricing
Setup: Cost of wireless modem plus nominal connection fee
Connection turnaround times are same day
| Company | Speed (downlink/uplink kbps) | Usage Caps | Price (AUD per month) |
| Unwired | 64/32 | 200MB | $15.95 (not broadband speed) |
| Unwired | 256/64 | 300MB | $29.95 |
| Unwired | 256/64 | 12GB | $64.95 |
| Unwired | 512/128 | 12GB | $89.95 |
| Unwired | 1024/256 | 12GB | $119.95 |
Satellite
Satellite services are avaliable as both 1-way or 2-way. 1-way services use a dial-up connection for the upload stream. Satellite broadband is offered by Optus (using Optus' satellites) and Telstra (using Optus' satellites). At the moment, satellite broadband uses the Optus B3 satellite which is to be replaced by the D-series.
Optus has offerings for both consumers and small business for both 2-way and 1-way. Available speeds range from 256 kbps to 1 mbps.
| Company | Speed (downlink/uplink kbps) | Usage Caps | Price (AUD per month) |
| Optus | 2-way 512/64 | 1GB | $99 |
| Optus | 2-way 512/128 | 3GB | $279 |
| Optus | 2-way 1000/256 | 3GB | $387 |
| Telstra | 1-way 512/dialup | 2GB | $79.95 |
| Telstra | 2-way 256/64 | 500MB | $104.95 |
| Telstra | 2-way 512/128 | 500MB | $124.95 |
| Telstra | 2-way 512/128 | 2GB | $249.95 |
| Telstra | 2-way 800/128 | 4GB | $499.95 |
*Note: both the 1-way and 2-way broadband packages are eligable for a significant government rebate for subscribers living in a designated rural zone under the HiBIS scheme.
Providers
There are 10 ISP's in Australia with 100,000 or more subscribers. Currently Telstra is attracting just over 40% of new broadband subscriptions, and its current plans calls for that to be extended beyond 50%
Telstra Bigpond Government owned, wholesaler
Optus Cable and Wireless
iiNet
TPG budget provider
Dodo another budget provider
Internode is enabling ADSL2
Further
ADSL2 is currently being deployed but availability is very limited to a select few cities and then only a select few customers. ADSL2 promises 24mbit downloads with 1024kbps uploads and currently many exchanges are scheduled for the upgrade but there have been many complaints about Telstra holding back other providers from uploading by restricting DSLAM space in exchanges in an effort to preserve its premium business services.
The following is the pricing schedule for ADSL2 from Internode. In these plans uploads are not calculated in allocations. All these plans include 10 hours of national calls (VoIP)
Internode - 15 GB - Dynamic IP - $59.95 /mo
Internode - 15 GB - Static - $79.95 /mo
Internode - 30 GB - Dynamic - $79.95 /mo
Internode - 30 GB - Static - $99.95 /mo
Internode - 60 GB - Dynamic - $119.95 /mo