Palmerston North broadband speeds past others

By JUHA SAARINEN

While most New Zealand's broadband customers consider themselves lucky to get connection speeds in the hundreds of kilobit per second range, Palmerston North's business district can network at 10 and 100 megabit per second thanks to a local internet provider taking the initiative.

The fast network connections are being rolled out by Inspired Networks and consist of a 2km fibre-optic cable circuit.

Group managing director James Watts said the fibre-optic rollout was a non-profit effort supported by local companies and bodies, aiming to provide a high-speed network that was also affordable.

"We are looking at charging $100 a month for 10 megabit per second connections, with a 100 megabit per second option available for $300," Watts said.

On top of that, customers will have to pay for internet data usage, but Watts said the monthly caps "will be large, 10-40GB and affordable" although he declined to reveal exact pricing.

He said a flat-rate plan was in the works, but "we have to be a bit careful with the student market" as those customers "tend to break data usage records easily".

At the moment, Inspired Networks claims to have around 40 customers on the fibre-optic network, with 350 to 400 office spaces being connected by the end of the year.

Asked how Inspired Networks would make money if it is run on a non-profit basis, Watts said he expected to sell services to customers over it.