Both Australia and New Zealand look set to get substantially improved internet access with annoucnements on both sides of the Tasman of broadband plans.

The new fibre-to-the-home network would take eight years to build, cost $43 billion, and give 90 per cent of Australian households download speeds 100 times faster than they currently experience.
In the process Australia will break the Telstra monolopy and stalemate in Internet connectively. 

Communications and Information Technology Minister Steven Joyce said a new Crown-owned company would work with private sector partners as a key part of its plan to deliver ultra-fast broadband to 75 per cent of New Zealanders’ homes, workplaces and places of study within ten years.

The Government has committed up to $1.5 billion of taxpayers’ money for the roll-out and expects that to be at least matched by the private sector.

Both plans do mean that both countries might finally get to experience the internet as other countries do.


It will be interesting to see how they develop. Hopefully the plans won’t get delayed by politics and by big business politics of Telstra and Telecom.