Published on the 16/12/2014 | Written by Beverley Head

The Australian Government yesterday announced it had concluded the renegotiation of deals with Telstra and Optus that will allow NBN Co to use those companies’ communications infrastructure, subject to approvals being granted by the Australian Tax Office and the Competition and Consumer Commission.

While the previous Labor Government had signed an $11 billion deal with Telstra, its NBN plans were different to those now being championed by the Coalition, which has opted for a cheaper, slower, but more quickly delivered national network. That necessitated the agreement be rejigged. Where Labor had wanted fibre to the premises, the current plan calls for fibre to the node deployment of the NBN.

The revised agreement sees NBN Co progressively take ownership of elements of Telstra’s copper and Hybrid Fibre Coaxial (HFC) networks where it represents the fastest and most cost effective way to deliver fast broadband.

According to NBN Co CEO Bill Morrow: “This deal will bring down the overall cost of building the NBN and enable us to complete the rollout much earlier than originally anticipated with less disruption to residents and communities.”

According to NBN around 309,000 premises across Australia are connected to the NBN today with plans afoot for a further 3.3 million connections to be completed or under construction by mid-2016.

The original agreement between NBN Co and Telstra, struck in June 2011, gave NBN Co access to Telstra assets such as ducts, pits and exchanges to use in the rollout the NBN, but not access to Telstra’s copper or HFC assets which has now been included in the arrangement.

NBN Co also announced it had signed a deal, reportedly worth about $800,000, to allow it to also take control of parts of Optus’ HFC network where that makes sense to allow a speedier NBN rollout. Previously the NBN Co/Optus deal had Optus customers being transitioned to the NBN while the HFC network was shut down.