nbn has released details of the first areas set to receive Fibre-to-the-Curb (FTTC) technology.
Around 700,000 homes and businesses are expected to have the FFTC rolled out to their area.
Some of the suburbs include Burnside, Brooklyn, Coburg North, pockets of Collingwood, Cremorne, Richmond Carolyn Springs, Derrimut, Frankston and Williamstown in Melbourne and Alexandria, Botany, Caringbah South, Cronulla, Denham Court, Erskineville, Gladesville, Horningsea Park, Hunters Hill, Lugano, Mona Vale, Peakhurst, Revesby, Tennyson Point, Woolooware and Woronora Heights in Sydney.
The world-first technology delivers fibre all the way to the telecom pit, or footpath, outside a home. The fibre then connects with a small distribution point unit (DPU) that then uses the existing copper line to deliver fast broadband to the premises over a relatively short distance.
This means nbn does not need to conduct civil works on the personal property of the home/business owner to run a new fibre-optic line as would be required for a Fibre-to-the-Premises (FTTP) connection.
Using VDSL2 technology the company can deliver the same 100/40Mbps services provided over FTTP while also providing simple options to upgrade when future demand arises.
The first area to be built will be Coburg North in Melbourne where nbn will hold trial services with retailers in the second half of 2017.
Commercial services for FFTC are expected to launch in the first half of 2018 at which point nbn is expecting to have 100,000 homes and businesses ready to connect to the service.
Peter Ryan, nbn Chief Network Engineering Officer, said, “Our goal is to deliver broadband in the most cost and time efficient manner possible and FFTC will help us do this in many parts of the nbn network.”
