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Wireless broadband Recovers In Bush |
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Written by Adam Gosling
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Monday, 11 September 2006 |
According to Australian Market Research company, Market
Clarity, there has been something of a recovery in the rural wireless broadband
market.
After a slump in the number of ISPs offering wireless
broadband at the end of last year, the market is back on track and apparently
not waiting for WiMax, says the research.
Market Clarity CEO Shara Evans told the ACIF Future Wireless
Forum that wireless broadband has begun to surge again as an access option. After
falling to below 100, there are now nearly 130 ISPs with wireless listed as an
access option, Evans told the conference.
In Market Clarity's update of the fixed wireless broadband
access market, the company also found a continuing trend to deploy new fixed
wireless broadband infrastructure in rural and regional locations.
More than 83 per cent% of Wireless ISPs offer regional
services, either because they have both metro and regional services, or because
they have focused on regional services alone.
There are now 56 per cent more wireless broadband
infrastructure owners located outside metropolitan areas than there are in Australia's
cities.
This reflects several market conditions, Evans said. "In
metropolitan areas, ISPs have wholesale wireless service options to choose
from, which saves them the expense and effort of deploying their own
infrastructure. In rural locations, an ISP may have no choice but to deploy its
own fixed wireless services.
"However, as is the case with ADSL, we see a very strong concentration
of fixed wireless access in the most populous states, with the largest number
of infrastructure owners located in NSW and Queensland, both in metropolitan and
regional markets."
If you were unable to attend the Wireless Future Forum, Setting
the Scene for Wireless is a presentation-style report available from Market
Clarity for $495 plus GST. http://www.marketclarity.com.au/research,
Meanwhile, the company also looked at Satellite
communications and found that despite federal government initiatives to make
satellite broadband more competitive, Australia still retains a
relatively small satellite broadband provider market.
Speaking this time at the 2006 ATUG Satellite Forum in late
August, Market Clarity's CEO, Shara Evans told the conference that there are
now more than 550 ISPs in Australia,
but only 33 provide retail satellite services.
This compared to 473 offering ADSL services and 129 with fixed
wireless broadband on offer.
The research found only 6 ISPs rely solely on satellite
services, with most providers using satellite to extend their reach to remote
and regional locations where ADSL-based services are not viable.
Even with Federal Government subsidies, Market Clarity found
that this important regional access technology remains expensive on both a
monthly fee and a per-megabyte basis. "Unfortunately, satellite providers have
mostly been slow to respond to the growth of ‘shaped' plans as an alternative
to download fees," Evans said.
"As a result, a heavy user would find satellite broadband
more than ten times more expensive than an ADSL service being used with the
same levels of downloads."
Evans said that although satellite remains vital in
applications such as health, farming, remote education, mining and emergency
services, but providers need to look for more ways to make their services more
viable for the community at large.
Positioning Satellite in 2006 is a presentation-style report
available now from Market Clarity at http://www.marketclarity.com.au,
for $495 plus GST.
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