Prices set to drop in rollout

By ADAM GIFFORD

Trade and Enterprise New Zealand has agreed to Southland's spending more than half its $2 million in regional development funding to roll out broadband services.

"Broadband is our number one priority, but we also want some money for the airport and for our living Fiordland project," said Venture Southland strategic projects manager Steve Canny.

The exact sum to be paid out will be revealed early next month when Prime Minister Helen Clark presides over the commercial launch.

Canny said the money comes on top of the $2 million put up by the Government as part of its Provincial Broadband extension (Probe) project, $921,000 from the community Trust of Southland, money spent so far by the region's councils and capital invested by wireless internet provider Walker Wireless and joint venture partner Vodafone.

Canny said pricing to customers should be lower than Telecom's JetStream offering.

"The contracts will in fact reduce. They will be far less than we have been quoted because some costs are coming down because of volume purchasing," Canny said.

Walker Wireless has been working with test customers at Tuatapere and rolling out its network across the rest of the province.

Canny said over the past three months the Invercargill council has blown fibre down conduits in the central business district for less than $100,000, giving urban customers access to the network at speeds of more than 100 megabits per second.

"We buried air [empty conduits] when we redeveloped the inner city. It's all about putting in the building blocks to get communities together," Canny said. "Local authorities can justify the expenditure because they share infrastructure."

The Invercargill and Southland councils have shared their IT applications and infrastructure.

Telecom and Broadcast communications are also active in Southland, setting up a service mixing Telecom's copper with wireless equipment from Airspan.