• About
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe
  • Contact
  • Events
Saturday, July 19, 2025
Newsletter
SUBSCRIBE
  • News
    • Contracts awarded
    • Open tenders and opportunities
    • Events
  • Features
  • Water
  • Wastewater
  • Gas
  • Electricity
  • Civil Construction
  • Events
No Results
View All Results
  • News
    • Contracts awarded
    • Open tenders and opportunities
    • Events
  • Features
  • Water
  • Wastewater
  • Gas
  • Electricity
  • Civil Construction
  • Events
No Results
View All Results
Home News

NBN Co assess dark fibre procurement for businesses

by Charlotte Pordage
January 29, 2020
in Digital Utilities, News, Telecommunications
Reading Time: 2 mins read
A A
dark fibre
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

NBN Co will explore possible approaches for the procurement of additional dark fibre services for enterprise and government customers in locations already served by existing fibre in its telecommunications industry consultation paper.

NBN Co is proposing to augment its extensive deployment of Fibre to the Premises (FTTP) technology by drawing greater utility from the spare capacity in Australia’s existing stock of dark fibre infrastructure. The company’s plan is to achieve more efficient investment outcomes for the benefit of enterprise and government customers requiring fibre.

NBN Co Chief Strategy and Transformation Officer, Will Irving, said, “Enterprise and government customers require access to high-speed, committed bandwidth, business-grade, symmetrical services that can only be delivered over fibre infrastructure.

“To date, whilst we have usually installed new fibre connections to large customer locations when requested, we have made some limited use of existing fibre when we have done so.

“However, because other network operators may have spare capacity on infrastructure serving some of these locations it may be unnecessary for NBN Co to duplicate the fibre infrastructure serving those premises.

“We hear the industry, and this consultation paper explores ways NBN Co might efficiently obtain the use of that existing fibre to serve the needs of business and government customers who wish to be connected using the nbn network.”

The company is proposing two possible approaches to customer premises dark fibre procurement.

Option one would involve the expansion of NBN Co’s current Request For Proposal (RFP) process, in which the company would request one or more pre-qualified nbn-approved suppliers to provide a proposal to supply dark fibre connectivity services at specific locations to support the delivery of either nbn’s TC2 or Enterprise Ethernet service.

Option two involves NBN Co establishing an industry-wide reverse auction process by which the company would periodically conduct reverse auctions, allowing existing fibre network providers to bid, on a confidential basis, to supply NBN Co with dark fibre connectivity services to specified locations on specific, predetermined standard terms and conditions.

NBN Co is looking to facilitate the use of third-party dark fibre connections with the objective of lowering the expected economic costs and/or time to delivery compared to NBN Co deploying its own infrastructure (including applying a commercial cost of capital no less than the rate agreed with the ACCC in its Special Access Undertaking).

NBN Co has invited network carriers to submit written submissions in response to its industry consultation paper: Options for establishing an industry-wide procurement process to make greater use of third-party fibre infrastructure by 24 February 2020.

Related Posts

NEAC director, Stephen Craig with a Living Lab participant. Image: CSIRO

New CSIRO analysis centre powering energy transition 

by Katie Livingston
July 17, 2025

CSIRO has launched the National Energy Analysis Centre (NEAC), which aims to support, accelerate and de-risk Australia’s complex energy transition.  ...

Image: Programmed

Bringing culture and connection to remote sites

by Katie Livingston
July 16, 2025

Beyond service delivery, Programmed helps build environments that foster connection, and support workforce morale in remote operations.  At 29Metals’ Golden...

Image: Schneider Electric 

Future-proofing water operations

by Katie Livingston
July 16, 2025

Faced with unprecedented challenges, water authorities are rethinking their operations, and they need digital tools that can keep pace.  The...

Please login to join discussion

Read our magazine

Join our newsletter

View our privacy policy, collection notice and terms and conditions to understand how we use your personal information.
Utility is the title of choice for decision makers at all levels of water and energy utilities, as well as other major players like consulting engineers and first-tier contractors. Utility is integrated across print and online, and explores the biggest news and issues across the utility industry. It is Australia’s only dedicated utility magazine, and covers all areas of the utility sector, including water and sewer, gas, electricity, communications and the NBN.

Subscribe to our newsletter

View our privacy policy, collection notice and terms and conditions to understand how we use your personal information.

About Utility

  • About
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe
  • Contact
  • Digital magazine
  • Events
  • Terms & Conditions
  • Privacy Collection Notice
  • Privacy Policy

Popular Topics

  • News
  • Water
  • Electricity
  • Projects
  • Water and Wastewater Treatment
  • Spotlight
  • Civil Construction
  • Renewable Energy

© 2025 All Rights Reserved. All content published on this site is the property of Prime Creative Media. Unauthorised reproduction is prohibited

No Results
View All Results
NEWSLETTER
SUBSCRIBE
  • News
    • Contracts awarded
    • Open tenders and opportunities
    • Events
  • Features
  • Water
  • Wastewater
  • Gas
  • Electricity
  • Civil Construction
  • Events
  • About
  • Advertise
  • Subscribe
  • Contact

© 2025 All Rights Reserved. All content published on this site is the property of Prime Creative Media. Unauthorised reproduction is prohibited