NBN Fails To Deliver Service Metres From Own HQ Millions In Revenue Lost

The National Broadband Network has become one big joke claim executives in North Sydney, while NBN CEOStephen Rue is claiming that they have now passed more than 9.9 million households and businesses in Australia office towers including 65 metres from the NBN head office in North Sydney are still waiting to get an NBN connection raising questions as to the revenue raising priorities of the NBN.

275 Alfred Street is right across the road from the NBN office, called the Bayer Building it’s where approximately 3,000 employees work, it houses several well-known Companies including technology business, however a search of Telstra, and Optus NBN services reveals that the NBN has not been connected to this building and is still to be connected, no date appears to have been set.

Some data Companies who worked in the building have already moved because of a lack of high-speed connectivity, others have run direct fibre pipes from Optus and China Telecom into their offices at “great expense”.

Some tenants in the building claim that this raises “Serious” questions as to the business case for the NBN when a single user in Tasmania or outback Australia has access to fast broadband but not a key CBD business area metres away from the NBN’s head office.

NBN Co chief executive Stephen Rue said the company was now “a year away from completing” its build-out phase but he has failed to identify why major business who tend to pay more for a connection over a single household are not being priortise.

According to an NBN media executive the priority of the NBN was to “supply single households first” over CBD business areas. She claimed that this decision was mandated by the then Labor Government when the NBN was first conceived.

Speaking at The Australian’s Competitive Advantage Forum in Sydney yesterday Rue bragged about the 9.5 million houses and businesses “ready to connect” as of May this year Vs 6.7 million in May last year. He failed to reveal how many were on the cheapest NBN plan.

The NBN’s last monthly report shows more than 5.4 million homes and businesses have connected to the network, as of May, up from 3.9 million in May last year.

The NBN last night posted on its website that there were now a record 9.93 million homes and businesses that were “ready to connect” as of last month — bypassing its target of 9.7 million “ready to connect” homes and businesses for the financial year to June.

The new figures for last month are up from 9.5 million houses and businesses “ready to connect” as of May this year and 6.7 million in May last year.

“We’ve been through that period of building an infrastructure but also connecting customers on to the network,” Mr Rue told the forum.

“We are now one year away from completing the build phase and we still will be adding many more customers on to the network.’’

Stephen Rue NBN CEO

Mr Rue said the NBN had begun its infrastructure rollout by starting with underserviced broadband areas of Australia.

It appears that North Sydney is not one of those areas despite it being an area where significant revenue could be generated to pay for the NBN.

In 2016 NBN Co. said it was on target for a total build bill of $49 billion, but by late 2018 the estimated final cost was $51 billion.

Rue said, “This means we prioritised (building out to serve) a lot of regional and rural Australians,” he said.

He failed to explain why revenue generation had not come first and low revenue home connections had been prioritised behind key businesses.

He said the NBN was now focusing on finalising its network in the cities and also finishing “difficult to complete” builds.

This included building past heritage-listed homes and homes and businesses which were difficult to get to.

Officials have not explained why their own head office has fast NBN broadband and a building across the road has none despite both a road and a bridge linking the two buildings.

He said the NBN had now finished its infrastructure build-out in Tasmania and “we will continue to complete builds in various states as we go”.

He said the NBN would allow small businesses around Australia to build new revenue streams by selling products to the rest of the world.

Other benefits would include telehealth and improved educational services.

As one CEO in the Bayer Building said, “What a joke”, 5G will arrive faster than the NBN and deliver faster speeds, Rue is an utter dill who has not realised that the NBN is dead in the water and that 5G is the future”.