National Broadband Network (Australia)

The National Broadband Network (NBN) is an Australian national wholesale open-access data network project with both wired, and radio communication components being rolled out and operated by NBN Co Limited (nbn™).

Rationales for this national telecommunications infrastructure project included replacing the existing copper cable telephony network which is approaching end of life, and the rapidly growing demand for internet access to support a growing range of services.

The largest infrastructure project in Australia's history, it has been the subject of significant political contention and was an issue in the 2013 federal election.

The first Rudd government had proposed to develop a modern optical fibre telecommunications network to provide broadband access to 93% of the Australian population at 100 Mbit/s, with those areas and people outside the network footprint to be provided broadband access through fixed wireless and geosynchronous telecommunications satellite.

Tony Abbott, as Leader of the Opposition, and Malcolm Turnbull, as Shadow Minister for Communications took a very antagonistic approach to the proposal arguing that the demand for such a service was not significant, and thus the estimated cost was too high and timeline for implementation too long.

With the election of the Abbott government in 2013 rollout of Fibre to the Premises was limited to those areas already in development with a delay on new development imposed as Malcolm Turnbull (then Minister for Communications) appointed a number of committees to advise him on future directions. Later implementation of the Multi-Technological Mix (MTM) commenced with the promise of earlier completion and significant cost savings compared to the earlier approach. The predominant change was the adoption of a mixed copper/optical technology with Fibre to the Node (FTTN).

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