Networking

When it comes to broadband connectivity, Australian small businesses with around 10 or fewer users are stuck in a product gap. There’s a good chance your premises’ NBN connection cannot deliver the speed your business really needs, but getting something faster can quickly get more expensive. Speed isn’t the only consideration for a business-grade internet connection, of course. You need reliability because downtime means not just annoyance but also lost revenue, and you need prompt support when things go wrong. You might also need dedicated IP addresses so you can set up a permanent high-speed connection to a branch office or a VPN gateway for your staff to securely work from home — after all, hasn’t that become a thing during the pandemic? You might even want to look at getting a broadband package with a proper service level agreement (SLA), where the vendor commits to standards of speed and reliability where there are penalties if they don’t deliver. For example, vendors supplying NBN connections can offer enhanced SLA options. Instead of the standard business hours fault reporting with rectification by 5pm the next business day, you can pay for fault reporting 24/7 with rectification in as little as four hours. Remember, consumer-grade broadband is provided as “best effort,” but in business, sorry isn’t good enough. Here, then, are some business-grade broadband options for SMEs.

We haven’t listed every single option because there are a plethora of smaller NBN resellers with broadly similar offerings. Nor have we listed every option from the vendors we chose. Here are just some highlights that are featured in their offerings. If you see an add-on you like with one vendor’s product, ask others if they can provide it too. This is intended as a guide for shopping around — especially if you’re thinking about adding phone services or data service add-ons, such as email, security, or backups.

Fastest NBN, plus bonus entertainment packages

Optus offers the two standard NBN speed choices, 50/20 and 100/20, starting at AU$75 and AU$95 per month, respectively. If you have an eligible FttP or HFC service then there’s also the so-called Superfast with a “typical busy period” speed of 215Mbps down and 18.5Mbps up for an extra AU$35 per month, and the “Ultrafast” at 250Mbps down and 37.5Mbps up for an extra AU$55. All plans include unlimited data and automatic fail-over to the Optus LTE/4G network in the event of a failure, with the switch happening in one to six minutes. They also include the Optus-branded Wi-Fi modem, but you’ll need to stay connected for 36 months otherwise you will be charged for it. Your main upsell options are the “Ultimate” pack with a Wi-Fi booster to extend the range through your premises, and a security add-on to monitor Wi-Fi connections for threats; or the “Entertainer” pack with a Fetch TV set-top box and one premium channel pack. Or you can pay for both. All plans also include the Optus Sport and OS Fitness video streaming channels, with Premier League and UEFA Champions League matches live, plus the UEFA Nations League, UEFA Europa League, and European Qualifiers. Optus can boast that it’s currently rated number one for NBN average download speeds by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, although of course, that may not last forever. If you want symmetrical speeds, though, you’ll be needing something from their Optus Evolve suite of products. Given that they’re targeting “corporate offices”, that’s probably not for your small business.

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If you’re in Adelaide, you’re really in luck

TPG’s business plans start with a somewhat minimalistic NBN12 product, with 12Mbps download speed and a mere 1Mbps upload for AU$70 a month. That’s not enough for even one stream of reliable video conferencing, and it’s truly glacial if you have data to upload. But it might handle one or two workers with some point-of-sale transactions or other lightweight cloud services.The usual 50/20 and 100/20 products start at AU$80 and AU$100 a month, respectively. At that price there’s a 500GB per month data cap (250GB peak and 250GB off-peak), though it includes unlimited local and standard national calls. Add AU$10 per month for unlimited data, and another AU$10 per month for unlimited calls to mobiles.All of TPG’s NBN plans have a AU$100 set-up fee unless you sign an 18-month contract. There’s no charge for moving up or down speed. All business plans come with a static IP address.TPG also offers unlimited symmetrical fibre connections to “TPG lit buildings (excludes data centres)” at 400Mbps for an advertised AU$400 per month (plus GST so it’s actually AU$440 per month), and 1Gbps for an advertised AU$800 per month (actually AU$880).The bandwidth can be split among up to four services, so customers can allocate dedicated bandwidth to voice, or to links to branch offices, or specific cloud services.There’s a 99.95% availability SLA, backed by outage restoration targets and rebates. Contract terms are 24 months and up. If you’re in Adelaide, and specifically the CBD or North Adelaide, TPG has unlimited 1Gbps fibre for AU$400 per month (really AU$440) as part of the Ten Gigabit Adelaide network.

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An all-Australian operation with an army of happy customers

Competitors envy Aussie Broadband’s customer satisfaction ratings. Customers like its all-Australia support and clarity of communications.Business NBN packages are sold as a simple-to-understand selection from the options NBN gives Aussie. They start at AU$80 per month for 50/20 speeds, ranging up to AU$430 per month for 1000/400, all with unlimited data. Optionally, upgrade to priority or even 100% guaranteed bandwidth, or add on NBN’s enhanced SLA.Aussie also offers its own Fast Aussie Fibre product, providing symmetrical speeds and a 1:1 contention ratio. Speeds start at 250/250 for AU$300 per month (plus GST so it’s really AU$330), through to 1000/1000 for AU$800 (really AU$880), then through 2Gbps and 5Gbps options, all the way up to 10Gbps symmetric for AU$5,000 per month (really AU$5,500).Fast Aussie Fibre comes with a 99.95% uptime SLA, and zero set-up fee if you sign for 36 months, although 12 and 24 month contracts are available.

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An independent fixed wireless network provides another choice

The rapidly-growing company formerly known as Spirit Telecom has transformed into an integrated IT and telco business. For some businesses, the ability to bundle internet, internal networks, voice, security, support, and applications into a single supported package could be a key advantage.Spirits offers the usual NBN TC4 and non-NBN symmetrical fibre products, from AU$130 and AU$420 per month, respectively, with the potential to use “all possible options out there in the market”.Another key difference is their Sky-Speed Internet, Spirit’s own fixed wireless network along Australia’s east coast. Starting at AU$300 per month and offering speeds of 25/25 up to 1000/1000, this might be a good option for high-speed broadband in regional areas.All business customers are supported by the company’s Australian support team, assisted by the network operations centre in Makati in the Philippines.Spirit says its core target market is customers with between 50 and 500 users, but for businesses with demanding data requirements they might be worth a look.

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Australia’s original telco is wherever you are

It must be said: No matter what connectivity technology you want, or what add-ons you’re after, Telstra will be able to sell it to you. To describe Australia’s biggest telco’s product range as comprehensive is an understatement.That means it’s complex, and you’ll soon discover subtleties. One example is that the “Business NBN plans” sold to small businesses are slightly different from the “Business Broadband plans on the NBN network” sold to business and enterprise customers.If faster asymmetric NBN speeds are available at your location, prices range up to AU$450 per month for 1000/400.Symmetrical fibre links are available in the Telstra Internet Direct (NBN Enterprise Ethernet) and Telstra Internet Direct Lite (Telstra fibre) products, with a wide range of quality of service options. You’ll have to get a quote for your location.Telstra also offers a vast range of small business apps, including Microsoft 365, MYOB Essentials accounting, cybersecurity, digital marketing support, and even 24/7 general tech support.

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Let’s face it, it’s all about the NBN or avoiding it

For better or worse, the majesty of the national broadband network means that almost every premises in Australia has access to a broadband connection that delivers roughly the same basic performance options regardless of retail vendor. The problem is, however, some premises are more basic than others. What’s potentially on offer at any particular location will be a subset of what NBN calls Traffic Class 4 (TC4). The available speeds will be limited by the connection technology that’s in place. What each vendor then offers to sell will be some subset of that. Typically, a retail vendor will offer a plan at 50Mbps download and 20Mbps upload speeds (50/20), and one at 100/20. A post-installation line test will confirm the actual speeds that can be delivered. Getting anything faster on the NBN relies on the luck of having better technology provided at your location, such as fibre to the premises, or at least to the basement, or HFC. In the case of FttP, speeds up to 1000/400 might be available, depending on the vendor.This is why every vendor will ask for your address before even thinking about offering higher speeds. If your business needs more than what your luck-of-the-draw NBN can provide, you have two choices. Under the NBN Technology Choice Program, you can pay to upgrade your location to full fibre. As the company warns, however, “costs can vary greatly” and that could easily run into the thousands of dollars, especially outside inner city locations. That said, under the NBN Business Fibre Initiative, “an estimated 90% of business locations within the NBN network footprint” are now eligible for a connection to the company’s Enterprise Ethernet plan with no upfront connection cost to your provider if you sign a 36-month contract. Or you can look at what the vendors themselves can provide using their own non-NBN connectivity options. Once again it’s all about where you are and what gear they already have in your area. Either way, if your business is located in premises you rent or lease, you’ll also need to check with the owner to confirm that you’re allowed to do any work required as part of the installation.

The need for speed, and especially symmetry

“High-quality symmetrical upload and download speeds are vital for consistent business-grade day-to-day functions such as video conferencing or utilising cloud-hosted platforms and services,” says NBN on its website.Which is to say, even NBN says that NBN’s generic business broadband options are not completely suitable for business.If your business generates large data files rather than just downloading them from others, good upload speeds are vital. Think graphics, videos, or large scientific data sets.You’ll also need good upload speeds if you’re participating in video conferences rather than merely watching someone else’s video stream.Each platform will list its recommended link speeds for effective use.Remember that three employees joining the conference from their own desks counts as three streams, not one.In these cases, the broadband plan’s upload speed is the one you should really be concerned about, not the download speed.

What can you do to ensure you get the speeds you paid for?

The overall performance of any data network depends on its weakest link. Once you start looking at broadband internet connection speeds in the hundreds of megabits per second or more, the weakest link may well be something else.For the very best results, use a wired connection for every device on your office network. Make sure all your ethernet switches have ports rated for 1Gbps. Use quality Cat 6 ethernet cables and make sure to test every one of them. Dodgy connectors or kinks in the cable can dramatically reduce the data speed.If you prefer wireless, make sure all your wireless routers, access points, and extenders are correctly configured, and located where they’re getting as direct a signal as possible.Perhaps even use a Wi-Fi network mapping tool to make sure you’re not trying to use the same channel as other nearby networks, including those on the other side of a shared wall, or on the floor above or below. Some routers can automatically switch to vacant channels, some can’t.

What counts as a business?

Generally, business broadband plans are available to anyone with an Australian Business Number, or a company or other organisation with an Australian Company Number. This includes sole traders, even if they work from home.A vendor’s non-NBN options will usually have restrictions, however. Non-NBN business connections may only be available to commercial buildings, not apartment buildings or individual homes, for example.

Should you shop around and penny-pinch?

All prices in this guide are those listed by the vendors on their websites at the time of publication, excluding any time-limited special offers.NBN is currently discounting its pricing to vendors, for example, with a cheaper price for the first six months of a new NBN connection, and those discounts are being passed on by vendors to a greater or lesser degree.Always shop around, and always consider the price of broadband as just one component of your overall IT spend. It may well be that a broadband package costing a few dollars more includes extras that a cheaper vendor would be charging a lot extra for.If you’ll be using the NBN for your phone service as well, check how that can be packaged with data connectivity. Make sure to check the call rates too, especially if you make a lot of international calls or calls to mobiles.10 bucks extra per month to move from capped data to unlimited, or to jump up a whole speed range, should be a no-brainer.If a long-term contract is required, be sure to find out whether you can change the plan, how often, and whether a fee is involved. Make a note of when the contract is due to end, and know what the subsequent monthly charge will be, should you decide to continue on a month-to-month basis.We recommend getting a detailed quote that includes all one-time charges as well as a firm estimate of monthly charges, including taxes and fees.

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Amazon is getting ready to switch on a new service called Amazon Sidewalk, and if you own an Echo device, or a Ring Floodlight and Spotlight Cam, then the chances are that you are going to start donating part of your internet connection to making this work.  

The idea behind Amazon Sidewalk is that without a reliable internet connection, having a device like a webcam doorbell or security doorbell is somewhat pointless. So, to combat this poor connectivity, Amazon is planning to turn select Echo and Ring devices into Sidewalk Bridges and use your internet connection to help others. Starting June 8 (US only for now), Amazon will be turning your devices into Sidewalk Bridges unless you opt-out. Here’s how Amazon describes it: “Amazon Sidewalk helps your devices get connected and stay connected. For example, if your Echo device loses its wifi connection, Sidewalk can simplify reconnecting to your router. For select Ring devices, you can continue to receive motion alerts from your Ring Security Cams and customer support can still troubleshoot problems even if your devices lose their wifi connection. Sidewalk can also extend the working range for your Sidewalk-enabled devices, such as Ring smart lights, pet locators or smart locks, so they can stay connected and continue to work over longer distances. Amazon does not charge any fees to join Sidewalk.” Later this month, Tile tags will be able to connect to Amazon sidewalk, extending their capability and making them more competitive in the face of Apple’s AirTag. Must read: Dumping Google Chrome resulted in one colossal benefit

How much of your bandwidth will Sidewalk use up? According to Amazon, it is restricted to 80Kbps, or as Amazon puts it, about 1/40th of the bandwidth used to stream a typical high definition video, and the total monthly usage is capped at 500MB, which, as Amazon puts it, is equivalent to streaming about 10 minutes of high definition video. But is it secure? Amazon says yes, and has published a privacy and security whitepaper outlining how it has accomplished this. This document concludes with why users should have this feature enabled: “By sharing a small portion of their home network bandwidth, neighbors give a little—but get a lot in return.” But does trust needs to be earned? Want to say no to Amazon Sidewalk? Here’s how: Fire up your Alexa appTap More and then SettingsTap Account SettingsTap Amazon SidewalkNow you can turn Amazon Sidewalk on or off What do you think about Amazon Sidewalk? Let me know in the comments below. More

Networking firm Cisco has appointed Ricardo Mucci as the new country manager for its Brazilian subsidiary.Mucci succeeds Laércio Albuquerque, who has been promoted to a regional role in March as part of a strategy to accelerate the uptake and evolution of the company’s networking systems in the region in a context of digital transformation.

Networking

Formerly head of Cisco’s enterprise segment in Brazil, Mucci joined the company in 2017 as director of the firm’s public sector practice. The new leader was involved in various projects alongside Brazilian city governments aimed at ensuring continuity of essential activities in areas such as health, education and the judiciary through the adoption of the company’s technologies.A veteran of the technology sector in Brazil, Mucci has been working in the field over the last 27 years. Prior to Cisco, the executive was the public sector director at Oracle and also held senior roles in companies such as IBM and Telefonica. “As a leader focused on business growth and digital transformation, Mucci will play an important role in supporting our customers and partners in their digital journeys as businesses move towards the so-called hybrid model,” said Laércio Albuquerque, vice president at Cisco Latin America in reference to the new country manager, who has also been working to expand the footprint of Cisco Networking Academy, the firm’s education and employability program, through partnerships with governments nationwide. “Companies and governments have been advancing rapidly in the digital transformation and we want to help our customers in the development of new secure applications and prepared for the future hybrid world, where the cloud must be at the center of everything”, said Mucci, adding this vision will be made possible through the strengthening of the firm’s channel ecosystem. More

The Department of Homeland Security announced a new deal with AT&T that will see the telecoms giant “modernize and transform” its telecommunications and network infrastructure.In a statement, the organizations said AT&T had been given four different task orders worth a total of $306 Million over the next 12 years. AT&T is planning to shift DHS and its 240,000 employees to an all-IP network.The task orders cover networking services for the DHS headquarters, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, and the Science and Technology Directorate.In addition to IP-based networking services, AT&T will provide all four with data networking, voice collaboration, equipment, security, and labor. DHS will also be given access to FirstNet, a network built for first responders and public safety personnel that offers “wireless edge solutions for primary and failover connectivity.”DHS wants AT&T to virtualize its networking capabilities and provide them with other technologies like SD-WAN and “cybersecurity protections that reduce the number of internet connections for improved monitoring and zero-trust networking.”Work on the projects begins today, according to the statement.  More

Image: APH
NBN CEO Stephen Rue has explained why the company responsible for the National Broadband Network has reversed its previous plans to use G.fast for speeds higher than 250Mbps, and instead announced earlier this month that users would get full fibre upgrades. In the current fibre to the curb (FttC) footprint, due to the company wanting to have a diversity of suppliers, half of FttC connections can only be used with VDSL, while the other half can do VDSL and G.Fast, Rue explained. “If we’re going to provide higher speeds beyond 100Mbps to people, we wanted to look at the long-term, the 15-year roadmap if you like,” he told Senate Estimates on Thursday. “When we looked at it, we took the view that we’re using G-Fast, there would still be things like copper remediation, there may be still some home wiring in the home, and it was also going to be IT system builds for us and the retailers, and a harder thing for retailers to manage because they’d have to explain what service they were getting. “So we concluded that the best return on investment for those customers who wanted more than a 100Mbps was to provide a fibre lead-in.” Rue said it was not a complete abandonment of the technology, and there could be situations where NBN would use it, but retailers would not need to know it was in use. Another factor in favour of full fibre was in the FttC footprint, NBN had already pulled fibre down the street, so it was already close to the premises. “G.Fast absolutely could have delivered, certainly at 250 megs and above,” Rue said. “There’s no technical issue with G.Fast.”

The CEO would not be drawn on how many fibre lead-ins NBN was expecting to build, and asked that the question be deferred to the next set of hearings that would be after the company released its next corporate plan. In response to questions on notice, NBN said it had replaced approximately 47,700 NBN Co Connection Devices (NCDs) used on FttC connections across November to March as a result of severe weather. The company further said, during 2020, it swapped 57,000 NCDs and so far this year it has replaced 44,300 NCDs. In March, the company said it was looking for a long-term solution to lightning frying FttC equipment, which was highlighted in the Blue Mountains area of NSW. On Thursday, Rue revealed NBN had issued around half a million devices that might go pop if struck by lightning, or lightning landed nearby. “Investigations have found that in some instances a component in the device does not meet our design specifications and while these devices are failing in a safe way, it is happening more often than expected in selected areas causing a reliability issue for some customers,” Rue said. “In these areas, when a device does fail due to electrical over-stress, we are now replacing it with an NCD that meets our original design specifications, and is much less likely to fail again under similar circumstances. “Approximately 500,000 devices with the component issue were deployed into the network as the issue coincided with our peak FttC deployment period.” Although the root cause has yet to be established, Rue said the company is implementing a “fast-track” solution that aims to detect a failed device and have a replacement device shipped to customers in 24 hours. Amongst a bevy of questioning about its prime contracting arrangements, NBN revealed the issue with its technician workload software when it launched in New South Wales: It got overloaded. “What happened, when literally it was rolled out in New South Wales, the platform went down and we then had, due to literally the doubling of our workforce on the system, we then add the issues around the functionality where it wasn’t syncing properly, so therefore it caused a poor experience,” COO Kathrine Dyer said. The app uses ServiceMax that sits on top of the Salesforce platform, and it has a ServiceNow functionality in relation to scheduling and how work is fed into the ServiceMax tool, the COO said. Dyer said the software was hit by a trio of factors: A two-day platform outage that hit NBN and technicians; it wasn’t syncing; and updating its functionality. “We were getting agile-based feedback from the sub-contractors in relation to the usability, and we were working with them, based on the feedback we were getting, to streamline the usability as we were rolling out the app,” Dyer said. Related Coverage More

Image: Singtel
Singaporean telco Singtel has continued to see its balance sheet contract as it reported decreases across the board for the full year to the end of March. Revenue for the telco was down 5% from SG$16.5 billion to SG$15.6 billion, earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) dropped by 16% to SG$3.8 billion, and net profit halved to SG$554 million. All of these numbers were down in the last financial year, dramatically so in some cases. For net profit, the telco reported SG$3.1 billion in fiscal 2019, SG$2.5 billion higher than this year’s number. “This year’s results are disappointing given unprecedented headwinds from COVID-19 and ongoing structural challenges,” CEO Yuen Kuan Moon said. “NCS and our data centre services proved to be bright spots, showing strong growth as enterprises rushed to digitalise and transform their businesses. We will be capitalising on this mass digitalisation with plans for a strategic reset to drive recovery and growth.” One of the few positive areas for Singtel was the contribution from its regional associates, up 4% to SG$1.7 billion, however all the gains were posted by Bharti Airtel which reversed last year’s SG$403 million loss into profit of SG$23 million. Telkomsel was down 22% to SG$915 million, AIS dropped 8.5% to SG$334 million, Intouch saw its contribution fall 7.4% to SG$94 million, and Globe experienced a 15.6% decline to SG$346 million. Singtel’s consumer business in Singapore reported a revenue drop of 14% to SG$1.8 billion, and said during the second half it had seen reduced roaming, prepaid mobile, and voice revenue, while on the other hand, it had higher handset sales as consumers upgraded to 5G devices. EBTIDA was down 17% to SG$627 million. The enterprise segment reported revenue dropping 1.4% to SG$5.94 billion and EBITDA falling 5% to SG$1.51 billion. Managed services grew 9.7% to SG$1.95 billion, revenue for business application services jumped 5% to SG$592 million, and communications engineering saw sales increase 5% to SG$153 million. Headed in the other direction were all carriage services — mobile, equipment sales, data, and fixed voice — which collectively were down 10% to SG$2.68 billion. Cybersecurity was down very slightly to SG$564 million.

Broken out by unit, NCS saw revenue increase 6.2% to SG$2.3 billion and EBITDA grow 13% to SG$330 million, while Trustwave saw revenue steady at SG$393 million and EBITDA improve 92% to a SG$61 million loss. Along with Amobee, which posted revenue down 17.6% to SG$664 million and EBITDA shrink 85% to SG$4 million, Trustwave is now facing a strategic review. “The exceptional items in the second half year included non-cash impairment charges of SG$589 million ($438 million) and SG$336 million for the intangible assets and goodwill of Amobee and Global Cyber Security Business respectively,” the telco said. “The ongoing industry and operational challenges and COVID-19 pandemic have resulted in underperformance of their business plans and impacted the recoverable values of these businesses. Singtel has commenced a strategic review to consider options for these businesses in order to sharpen the group’s focus and ensure that these assets are positioned for growth.” As well as the review, NCS will be taking on Trustwave’s technology services, as the NCS is slated to become a “key growth driver”. “With its public-sector focus, NCS has been a consistent revenue growth engine for the Group over the years,” Yuen said. “It makes a lot of sense to develop this growth engine by casting its net further afield into the enterprise sector and markets outside Singapore where we have presence and synergies. There will be no letting up in the e-government side of the business, but this is a major turning point for NCS.” As for Singtel’s Australian arm, Optus walked away from the full year to March 31 a little battered and bruised. The company saw declines across the board, and thanks to a number of exceptional items, recorded a AU$208 million net loss for the year, a drop of AU$610 million. “With the completion of the NBN rollout in Australia and the subsequent migration of customers, Optus has undertaken a comprehensive review of its network assets and recorded non-cash impairment charges of AU$197 million due mainly to its legacy fixed access networks that will no longer be used,” the company said. Optus added it also had a AU$98 million item against its payroll review that saw thousands of its current and former workers potentially having underpaid superannuation. Optus is set to spend AU$1.5 billion in capital expenditure over its next financial year, while the rest of the Singtel group will spend SG$800 million. Related Coverage More

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Singapore-owned Australian telco Optus has walked away from the full year to March 31 a little battered and bruised. The company saw declines across the board, and thanks to a number of exceptional items, recorded a AU$208 million net loss for the year, a drop of AU$610 million. Revenue was down 7% to AU$8.32 billion, and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation (EBITDA) fell by a quarter to AU$2 billion, and underlying net profit dropped 98% to AU$8 million. The underlying profit turned into a AU$208 million net loss once AU$216 million of exceptional items were taken into account. “With the completion of the NBN rollout in Australia and the subsequent migration of customers, Optus has undertaken a comprehensive review of its network assets and recorded non-cash impairment charges of AU$197 million due mainly to its legacy fixed access networks that will no longer be used,” the company said. Optus added it also had a AU$98 million item against its payroll review that saw thousands of its current and former workers potentially having underpaid superannuation. “Optus has also undertaken a programme to review its staff compensation and has recorded an exceptional charge of AU$98 million relating to staff payroll adjustments, professional fees as well as remediation of Optus’ systems and processes,” it said. Beyond the exceptional items, Optus said the revenue reductions were due to COVID-19, lower payments from NBN for transferring customers coupled with shrinking margins on NBN connections, and lower equipment sales.

“This has been a challenging year with COVID-19 and structural NBN impacts affecting the whole industry,” Optus CEO Kelly Bayer Rosmarin said. “However, Optus continued to prioritise keeping Australians connected, ensuring our teams were safe and employed, and investing in our network, customer service, and digital experiences.” Giving an update on its plans to sell off its tower business, the company said it finished restructuring the towers into Australia Tower Network and began the sale process in April. Optus will be taking bids in June, and will look to wrap the divestiture of up to 70% of the business during the second half of 2021. Australia Tower Network has 3,212 towers under its remit, 565 committed builds, and a current tenancy ratio on its towers of 1.6. For its enterprise segment, revenue was up 2.3% to AU$1.23 billion. Managed services saw sales grow 7.3% to AU$448 million, cybersecurity increased 19% to AU$120 million, and mobile service revenue increased 9.3% to AU$173 million. Headed in the other direction, equipment sales plunged 21% to AU$61 million, data and internet dropped 5.6% to AU$237 million, and fixed voice declined 3% to AU$194 million. EBITDA for the enterprise division increased 21% to AU$116 million. For the consumer division, revenue was down 8.6% to AU$7.1 billion for the full year, EBITDA dropped 26% to AU$1.88 billion. Optus saw its number of prepaid plans drop 12% to 2.97 million, and postpaid plans fell 1% to 5.77 million. Average revenue per user in prepaid grew 2% to AU$19 a month, while postpaid was steady at AU$37. The total number of customers on Optus Sport grew during the year from 821,000 to 870,000. The company is set to spend AU$1.5 billion in capital expenditure over its next financial year, while the rest of the Singtel group will spend SG$800 million. Overall for Singtel, revenue was down 5.4% during the year to SG$15.6 billion, and EBITDA fell 15.6% to SG$3.8 billion. On Wednesday, Optus said it has completed a 5G standalone call using a handset from Oppo and network equipment from Ericsson. “The success of this technology milestone is a leap towards full deployment of Optus’ 5G standalone architecture nationwide, and we are already working on enabling 5G standalone voice calls using Voice over New Radio,” Optus managing director of networks Lambo Kanagaratnam said. “As we evolve our network, 5G standalone will enable future opportunities, including on-premise 5G and end-to-end network slicing allowing personalisation and control for our customers.” Related Coverage More

While most of us are deciding whether or not to upgrade to a new router that supports the latest Wi-Fi 6 standard (a.k.a. 802.11ax), it turns out there’s another new flavour of Wi-Fi already on its way. Called Wi-Fi 6E (E for ‘Extended’), this new standard adds the 6GHz frequency band to the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands currently supported by Wi-Fi 6 and its predecessor, Wi-Fi 5 (formerly known as 802.11ac).   With the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands becoming increasingly crowded, the new 6GHz band adds additional capacity that, according to the Wi-Fi Alliance, provides strong performance “even in very dense and congested environments”, such as sports arenas and business complexes.  Several networking companies have announced new routers that support Wi-Fi 6E, but Netgear is first off the starting block with its new Nighthawk RAXE500 Tri-Band Wi-Fi 6E Router. Priced at $599.99 (UK pricing TBA), the RAXE500 is very much a top-of-the-range option, boasting a top combined speed of 10.8Gbps, and eight internal antennae designed to stream data to as many as 60 devices simultaneously.   Netgear’s Nighthawk RAXE500 router supports the new 6GHz Wi-Fi 6E standard, delivering combined throughput of up to 10.8Gbps and ‘fast and reliable’ connections for up to 60 devices.
Image: Netgear
Netgear states that the new 6GHz band also allows the use of high-bandwidth 160MHz ‘channels’ — rather like sub-bands within the main 6GHz band — that are ideal for high-capacity applications such as streaming 4K or 8K video for entertainment or video conferencing.  The router is powered by a 1.8GHz quad-core processor and supports the latest WPA3 security standard. As well as providing high-performance Wi-Fi, the RAXE500 also includes multiple high-performance wired connections for an office network. There’s a dedicated 2.5Gbps ‘multi-gig’ Ethernet interface for high-speed internet connections, as well as five additional Gigabit Ethernet ports for wired devices, which also provide the ability to combine — or ‘aggregate’ — two ports for higher speed. The router also includes two USB 3.0 ports for connecting USB storage devices that can be shared with other network users.  Ports on the RAXE500 (left to right): 2x USB 3.0, WAN, 4x Gigabit Ethernet, 2.5Gbps Ethernet.
Image: Netgear
Netgear’s Nighthawk range tends to be primarily aimed at home users, but with so many people still working from home, Netgear is describing the RAXE500 as an ‘all-purpose’ router that’s suitable for video conferencing and e-learning as well.   Orbi Pro WiFi 6 Mini (SXK30): Affordable Wi-Fi 6 mesh networking.
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The company hasn’t yet brought Wi-Fi 6E to its business-oriented Orbi Pro mesh systems, but it has just introduced a new Orbi Pro model that aims to provide a more affordable entry-point for Wi-Fi 6 technology.  SEE: Hiring Kit: Computer Hardware Engineer (TechRepublic Premium)Previous models have been expensive tri-band mesh systems aimed at larger businesses, but the new Orbi Pro Wi-Fi 6 Mini is a more affordable dual-band option for home office use and small businesses. There are two options available, both providing Wi-Fi 6 speeds of 1.8Gbps and supporting up to 40 devices. Prices start at $299.99 for a two-piece system suitable for covering areas of up to 2,000 sq.ft, while a three-piece system that can cover 4,000 sq.ft comes in at $399.99. Like other Orbi Pro systems, the Mini allows you to create four separate networks (SSIDs) that can be assigned to different tasks or different groups of users, such as guests, employees, IT staff or admin.  RECENT AND RELATED CONTENT Netgear unveils high-performance network gear Netgear Nighthawk Wi-Fi routers go mesh Netgear releases new managed Wi-Fi access points for SMBs: WAX620 How much internet speed do you really need? Best Wi-Fi router in 2021: Expert reviews of top brands Read more reviews More