Posts by Gareth Ward
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Also, believe I've made this disclaimer before, but the company I work for is owned by a company that is owned by Telecom. In a business totally unrelated to anything we're discussing =)
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Yeah but price/quality is part of the demand factor.
I'm all for the plan, but think we need to be very careful in committing billions of taxpayer dollars. And once you start going beyond the $1.5b figure there'll be some pretty serious questions about return/opportunity cost. On the flipside, it has to actually deliver.So I reckon a model something like:
- FibreCo spends $3b getting a to-the-road network setup (50% Govt/50% private).
- The local partner for that build becomes the sole provider for connecting to the household (at a regulated price)
- Govt provides a subsidy to each local partner that sees that regulated price come down to a level that makes it attractive for anyone that wants it. Perhaps $99 or $10 a month on your "fibre bill" from your ISP.At which point the Govt is spending more than the proposed $1.5b (being the subsidies on top of that) but it looks like that's happening regardless.
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“If there’s even a hint that... well, it almost defies imagination that they’d be willing to that.”
Brilliant.
So IF there WAS a hint of something then it would be bad. What a scoop. -
You kinda have to think though, if a national fibre network can't get built by private players with a $1.5 BILLION subsidy to help them, then is the demand/need/benefit really there?
That's why I like the to-the-road approach, because it provides the backbone, removes some large-scale-uncertainty for private investors and allows for connections to then only be made on a "who actually wants it" basis
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The budgeted $1.5 billion is nothing like enough to pay the taxpayer's half of a high-speed fibre network reaching 75% of New Zealanders. The total cost is more like between $5bn and $10bn.
Interestingly, the study suggests that $3bn would possibly be enough to get fibre to the road. This is a model I originally preferred - with heavily subsidised connections for those who asked. This minimises unecessary rollout to premises that don't want or need it.
Unfortunately I liked that as a low cost model, which apparently it isn't, and Treasury believes that private investors won't be interested as they'd have no return (although some may be willing if they are then locked in as the final connectors) -
if Telecom lost control of Chorus their share price would tank
Well naturally, but each shareholder would also get a very large payout of their share of the serious moolah Chorus would bring in the new fibre environment. And I would expect Telecom to retain a non-controlling ownership stake.
I mean what's left? Xtra?
Well they'd still be a really muscled up Vodafone/ihug wouldn't they?
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We're at terror alert orange! Which means something might go down somewhere in some way at some point in time.
So look sharp!(Hey, those incessant repeats of the same clips on Comedy Central came in handy!)
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Not having been hooked into net culture at it's birth, what were the significant differences by gender in the experience?
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i still think 'babe flu' or piglet flu' would sound much nicer
Considering I've heard suggestion that the current strain is a mix of pig, avian and human influenza, I've suggested Turducken Flu elsewhere...
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re Telecom's play - interesting. The first option of "we'll align investment" seems to be counter to the intent behind the whole thing" and the second option "we'll own the ducting" seems like a off-topic move for them.
There is a subtle play in there that Chorus is "effectively" separated so should be able to circumvent the retail-ownership rules. I have some sympathy for that position - afterall, the whole point of operational separation was to enforce that.