Telstra Flicks the Switch on ADSL2+

By Greg McNevin

April 14, 2008: 2.4 million more Australians and small businesses now have access to download speeds of up to 20Mbps, as Telstra has completed upgrading over 900 exchanges around the country.

Coming in four months ahead of schedule, the upgrade is still a way off the 100Mbps much of the world is moving towards, however, as 80 percent of the exchanges are outside of metro areas the upgrade is quite significant for the state of regional broadband services.

Previously Telstra had only made ADSL2+ available in exchanges where it had competition. This upgrade comes after the government agreed that a compelling case has not been made by Telstra competitors for regulatory access to its network, however, some commentators suggest that the decision to expand the regional ADSL2+ is aimed at rebuilding government relations in the lead up to the national fibre-to-the node (FTTN) broadband network rollout.

Either way, the decision will no doubt be welcomed by regional businesses.

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