The National Broadband Network’s governing commercial body, the NBN Co, has announced that demand will be the key factor in determining coverage of the company’s interim satellite coverage.

 

The NBN Co has confirmed that where demand exists, priority will be given to access to alternate broadband services, subject to a service qualification process.

 

An ‘end-user customer service qualification process’ will be used to determine the quality of existing services, meaning the satellite service will not be extended to rural areas that receive a "metro comparable" commercial service, being speeds of at least 512/128 kbps, a 3GB per month data allowance, and a total price to the end customer of no more than $2500 over three year.

 

Under the Interim Satellite Service, the satellite equipment and installation will be provided by NBN Co, at no cost to the end-user customer for a standard installation.

NBN Co has also called for expressions of interest from retail service providers (RSPs) who would like to purchase wholesale satellite services to resell to eligible rural and remote customers.

 

From the scheduled commencement of the service in July until October, NBN Co is planning capacity to appoint up to seven RSPs, providing in total up to 300 services a month on a managed end-to-end service basis. From November NBN Co can appoint up to 20 RSPs, providing in total up to 1000 services a month, who will need to support traffic from a point of interconnect. Interested RSPs should contact their NBN Co account manager.

NBN Co has already signed two RSPs to participate in a trial phase from now until July 2011 – Harbour IT and Skymesh. They plan to test the service with up to 200 rural and remote customers, primarily existing ABG service users.