Ring of fibre lighting up around mountain

By ADAM GIFFORD

Taranaki district councils are set to underwrite the upgrading of Telecom exchanges to bring broadband internet access to 83 per cent of the province.

At present only 2 per cent of Taranaki residents - those serviced by the New Plymouth central exchange - can get Telecom's Jetstream ADSL (asynchronous digital subscriber line) service, which uses existing copper phone lines.

Richard Shearer, the chairman of the council-funded iTaranaki Broadband Steering Group, said Telecom's existing infrastructure meant it was able to offer more at a lower price than competing organisations such as TVNZ's Broadcast Communications Limited.

"Telecom already has a ring of fibre round the mountain connecting all the exchanges. We can light that up a bit," Shearer said.

"Going with Telecom allows us to knock off a large chunk of supply fairly easily, and then we can work on getting broadband to the remaining 17 per cent of residents."

A report to be put before the New Plymouth District Council tonight proposes the three councils guarantee Telecom up to $536,000 to upgrade 14 exchanges to xDSL standard.

"The sum of $536,000 is a worse-case contingency and the actual amounts to be paid are expected to be substantially less than this sum or zero," the report said.

This is modelled on an agreement between Telecom and the Otago Community Trust which has ensured all Otago high schools now have broadband access.

Telecom's Government relations manager, Bruce Parkes, said Telecom has been touting the Otago model to a range of communities, including Taranaki.

In the first stage, the Otago trust put up $236,000 to upgrade nine exchanges from Wanaka to Balclutha, on the understanding it would only have to pay up if Telecom was unable to get 20 business customers at each exchange.

"That has been going very well, to the extent the trust has agreed to a $130,000 underwrite to upgrade a further five exchanges," Parkes said.

"It is obvious not all those exchanges will prove economic but by co-operating with local organisations we get better uptake than we thought we would.

"It is not that these people have a cheque but that they are wired into the local community. In Ranfurly, what better way to market than having the local high school principal, who has world-class video conferencing, raving about the wonders of broadband."

Parkes said the Budget announcement of Government support for broadband roll outs through Vote Education "is near and dear to Telecom's heart".

Shearer said the iTaranaki initiative envisaged a broader partnership with Taranaki than the Otago situation, and negotiations are continuing on the pricing and services involved.

He said while the initial roll-out would get to every community with a high school, iTaranaki is also focused on the implications for business in the region.

iTaranaki hoped to get the upgrades in place within the three months.

"There is an element here that Telecom will be able to use Taranaki as a test bed for ADSL development and research," said Shearer, who also runs web hosting firm Webfarm and domain name registrar Freeparking.co.nz.

"ADSL usually only works up to 6km from the exchange, but because New Zealand's copper infrastructure is 6mm wire compared with 4mm elsewhere we think we can push ADSL out further - perhaps even to 10km."