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March 11, 2009
Telstra cops it and dishes it out
We can't help but wonder how independent telecommunications adviser Kevin Morgan is feeling now, just a few days after opining that the National Broadband Network tender process was about to explode in the Government's face, and it would have to start the process all over again.
This was inevitable, he explained, because "unless the Government can win a referendum changing section 51 of the Constitution so it can confiscate Telstra's network without compensation, none of the bids are realistic." Kevin has been pooh-poohing the idea that anyone but Telstra could build the network for a couple of years now.
His assertions are starkly at odds with the latest speculation that one of these unrealistic bids is going to be accepted as early as this week, and that, according to BBY analyst Mark McDonnell, there could be "quite a nasty regulatory outcome" for Telstra in whatever NBN bid the Government chooses.
Those suggestions offer an interesting context for Sol Trujillo's sudden announcement that Telstra will spend $300 million for a dramatic speed boost for its Melbourne cable network to 100Mbps, by Christmas. What with Internode earlier announcing retail fibre to the home on greenfields sites, Telstra must be starting to feel that it's slowly being surrounded.
Bleeding Edge can only speculate on whether anyone but the filthy rich could afford to use that network, what with a growing perception that Telstra screws its customers.
They're doing it again, in changing the way they charge landline customers for overseas calls. By charging in 30-second increments rather than one-second increments, they'll extract tens of million of dollars from the unwary.
This just in: There's some support for Kevin Morgan's view in this report on comments by Phil Varney, Australian GM of Gen-i.
Posted by cw at March 11, 2009 10:47 AM
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