Telstra Kicked Out of $15bn Broadband Project

An anonymous reader writes "Australia's largest telco and ISP, Telstra, has been kicked out of the bidding process to build a national broadband network (NBN) estimated to be worth $15 billion. The Aussie government had earlier given assurances that the proposal would be considered, however it now won't even be evaluated by the expert panel, which will make the recommendations to the Senator for Broadband and Communications. The government may now take steps to legislate so that Telstra can't build a network that competes with the NBN — leaving the incumbent to focus on wireless HSPA+ technology instead."

Comments

Re:What about competition?

[Max Littlemore]

You say eliminating the biggest provider will reduce competition? Eliminating a virtual monopoly is bad for competition? Wow.

I think it's a bit silly not even reviewing their proposal, but that's ridiculous.

Re:Senator Conroy's handiwork

[dbIII]

No. Sol has been playing politics on this broadband plan from the start. The trick to win the bid without putting in a proper bid would let him set his own terms.

All or nothing bet

[shirro]

Sol gambled and the shareholders lost. A triumph of greed over common sense. Has his reality distortion field finally shattered?

The current Telstra management seemed to have brought a lot of anti-regulation baggage with them from the US. They seemed unable or unwilling to adapt their management style to the realities of operating in Australia.

A lower return to shareholders would still have been a return but they had to be greedy. Now they might be a footnote in the countries broadband history.

Re:All or nothing bet

[c_g_hills]

"Trujillo's final dramatic quote to the analysts was "Nothing Stops Telstra"." (Business Spectator)

The man reeks of arrogance. Nothing good can come of letting the incumbant monopoly. I hope that Australia ends up with the network it really needs, rather than the one that Telstra has given them.

Re:Senator Conroy's handiwork

[TapeCutter]

"Senator Conroy's handiwork?" - I wish politics was that simple...

1) Conroy rarely comments on the filter because he does not support it. The only reason a filter is being "trialed" is to placate senator Fielding from the "Family First" party who under certain circumstances can hold the balance of power in the senate. (ie: the govt of the day is buying his vote by spending ~$100K on his pet project). It's political theater that most people expect to see die in the senate (including Telstra, who called it a 'pipedream'). One of the IPS's who is taking part in the trial is iiNet who's CEO wanted to take part in order to "prove it was unworkable".

2) The NBN has been in the works longer than Conroy has been in his position. When Telstra leaned it was not going to be handed the contract on a silver platter they very publicly refused to play by the rules of the tender. Personally I applaud both our current and previous governments for refusing to bend over for a large corporation.

How does a religious nutter like fielding get elected in the first place? - Culled from wikipedia: "In Victoria, Family First, the Christian Democrats and the DLP allocated their senate preferences to Labor, in order to help ensure the re-election of the number three Labor Senate candidate, Jacinta Collins, a Catholic who has conservative views on some social issues such as abortion. In exchange, Labor gave its Senate preferences in Victoria to Family First ahead of the Greens, expecting Family First to be eliminated before these preferences were distributed. In the event, however, Labor and Democrat preferences helped Family First's Steve Fielding beat the Green's David Risstrom to win the last Victorian Senate seat and become Family First's first Federal parliamentarian."

In otherwords Fielding was a pawn that nobody expected to win, let alone hold the balance of power! Now that he does, both sides of the house come knocking on his door in an attempt to sway his vote.

Re:No Competition?

[Nefarious Wheel]

They submitted a 13 page 'proposal' at the last minute while (apparently) even the smallest of the bids were throughly detailed.

Having been in The Machine before (what Australian contractor hasn't been that hungry at least once?) I suspect they simply couldn't get it together to make the bid. Sol decimated the Telstra bureaucracy. This is both good and bad; the latter because they have utterly no clue how to communicate internally any more. No way is that executive team going to do any bid work to that level any more, they just don't have it in them. Big isn't necessarily muscular. That dog is too old to go hunting.