NBN Co has released its unaudited third quarter results. The company says that it is tracking well towards its end of financial year rollout targets as it prepares to transition to a revised network rollout.
NBN Co’s unaudited third quarter accounts revealed:
- The company recorded an operating loss of $1.117 billion after generating revenue of $69.8 million in the nine months ended 31 March 2014. Telecommunications revenue rose to $38.5 million over the nine months.
- The continued expansion of the network saw life-to-date capital expenditure (excluding leased assets) increase to $4.9 billion and life-to-date operational expenditure rise to $2.4 billion.
- As at 31 March 2014, the network had passed 512,659 fixed line and fixed wireless premises, an increase of nearly 96,000, or 23 per cent over the previous quarter. This has resulted in an average run rate over the quarter of over 6,000 combined brownfields and greenfields premises per week and around 1,000 fixed wireless premises covered per week.
- There were 166,642 premises with an active NBN service at the end of March, an increase of 27 per cent over the quarter. Fibre users (brownfields and greenfields) rose by 39 per cent to 111,035 during the quarter.
- However, a third of brownfields premises (94,883 or 36 per cent) were unable to order a service despite being passed by NBN fibre (so-called Service Class 0). The company has instructed contractors to install lead-ins and connection boxes to premises at the same time the fibre is being laid in the street. Previously these tasks were carried out separately.
- During the quarter the number of activations for fixed wireless services increased by around 80 per cent to 11,673. The company also completed construction of a satellite ground station at Roma and the Telemetry, Tracking and Control Centre at Alice Springs.
- In terms of the core network, NBN Co has now completed 113 of its 121 Points of Interconnect, and 80 per cent of the transit network has been built.
NBN Co Chief Executive Officer Bill Morrow said:
“The purpose of the NBN is clear. Our job is to open up the digital economy and close the digital divide. But there are a range of issues we need to address. The primary focus for management has been on building the network rather than connecting families and businesses. We need to do both and we need to do them better.
“For instance, we are moving to a construction model that will see our delivery partners install lead-ins and connection boxes to the outside of a home as the fibre is being rolled out in the street. The aim is to increase the number of homes and businesses that are more easily able to connect to the NBN when it becomes available in a neighbourhood.
“There is more to analyse, more to improve and much more industry collaboration needed but we are making progress as evidenced by the metrics we are reporting today.”
Optimised Multi-Technology Mix
The company also reported that it is making solid progress towards the transition to a revised rollout model as set out in the Commonwealth’s Statement of Expectations to NBN Co, issued on 8 April 2014.
