Internet access is widely available in
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
, with 94% of New Zealanders having access to the internet . It first became accessible to university students in the country in 1989. , there are 1,867,000 broadband connections, of which 1,524,000 are residential and 361,000 are business or government.
(For reference, there are 1,679,800 households in New Zealand .)
Fibre to the home
Fiber to the ''x'' (FTTX; also spelled "fibre") or fiber in the loop is a generic term for any broadband network architecture using optical fiber to provide all or part of the local loop used for last mile telecommunications. As fiber optic ...
(FTTH) accounts for 32% of connections, and FTTH use is accelerating rapidly with 54% growth in 2018.
Digital subscriber line
Digital subscriber line (DSL; originally digital subscriber loop) is a family of technologies that are used to transmit digital data over telephone lines. In telecommunications marketing, the term DSL is widely understood to mean asymmetric di ...
(DSL) over
phone lines
A telephone line or telephone circuit (or just line or circuit industrywide) is a single-user circuit on a telephone communication system. It is designed to reproduce speech of a quality that is understandable. It is the physical wire or ot ...
provides 44% of connections (down 16% in 2018) and
cable internet
In telecommunications, cable Internet access, shortened to cable Internet, is a form of broadband Internet access which uses the same infrastructure as a cable television. Like digital subscriber line and fiber to the premises services, cable In ...
,
mobile broadband
Mobile broadband is the marketing term for Wireless broadband, wireless Internet access via mobile networks. Access to the network can be made through a portable modem, wireless modem, or a Tablet computer, tablet/smartphone (possibly Tetherin ...
,
fixed wireless
Fixed wireless is the operation of wireless communication devices or systems used to connect two fixed locations (e.g., building to building or tower to building) with a radio or other wireless link, such as laser bridge. Usually, fixed wireles ...
and
satellite broadband account for the remaining quarter of connections. Fibre to the home is provided through New Zealand's
Ultra-Fast Broadband
The Ultra-Fast Broadband initiative is a New Zealand Government programme of building fibre-to-the-home networks covering 87% of the population by the end of 2022. It is a public–private partnership of the government with four companies with ...
program, started after 2008 with a target of 87% of the population by 2020. FTTH is available to 67% of New Zealanders.
The phone and fibre networks are mostly owned by network company
Chorus Limited
Chorus is a provider of telecommunications infrastructure throughout New Zealand. It is listed on the NZX stock exchange and is in the NZX 50 Index. It is the owner of the majority of telephone lines and exchange equipment in New Zealand. It is ...
, which wholesale services to retail ISPs. Parts of
Wellington
Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
,
Kapiti Kapiti or Kāpiti may refer to:
*Kapiti Island, an island a short distance off the New Zealand coast north of Wellington
*Kapiti Coast District, the local government district which includes much of the Kapiti Coast
*Kapiti Coast Airport, an airport ...
and
Christchurch
Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon River / ...
have
cable internet
In telecommunications, cable Internet access, shortened to cable Internet, is a form of broadband Internet access which uses the same infrastructure as a cable television. Like digital subscriber line and fiber to the premises services, cable In ...
access. Nearly all of the population is covered by 3G
mobile broadband
Mobile broadband is the marketing term for Wireless broadband, wireless Internet access via mobile networks. Access to the network can be made through a portable modem, wireless modem, or a Tablet computer, tablet/smartphone (possibly Tetherin ...
, with 4G available to the majority. Satellite internet is available throughout the country.
,
Ookla
}
Speedtest.net, also known as Speedtest by Ookla, is a web service that provides free analysis of Internet access performance metrics, such as connection data rate and latency. It is the flagship product of Ookla, a web testing and network di ...
reports the average download speed for fixed broadband as 110.72 Mbit/s and the average upload speed as 70.32 Mbit/s (ranked 23rd in the world).
As of Q1 2017,
Akamai reports an average peak download speed of 70.8 Mbit/s (35th). For mobile broadband, , Ookla reports the average download speed as 53.59 Mbit/s and the average upload speed as 14.49 Mbit/s, ranking it 13th in the world.
Broadband pricing is at, or above the OECD average, and most connections have an
unlimited data cap. There are more than 80 ISPs, with two of them having three-quarters of the market. The New Zealand Government is funding two broadband expansion initiatives, with the aim of providing fibre to the home of 80% of the population and bringing broadband to 97.8% of the population by 2019. International connectivity is mainly provided by the
Southern Cross Cable
The Southern Cross Cable is a trans-Pacific network of telecommunications cables commissioned in 2000. The network is operated by the Bermuda-registered company ''Southern Cross Cables Limited''.
The network has 28,900 km of submarine an ...
.
Retail services
As of 2018, there are 829,000 DSL connections (down from 1.3 million in 2015), 44% of the broadband total, and 598,000 (up from 105,000) fibre connections, 32% of the total. There are also 441,000 (down from 485,000) cellular, satellite, cable and fixed wireless connections comprising 24% of the total.
DSL
Most of the telephone infrastructure is owned by
Chorus
Chorus may refer to:
Music
* Chorus (song) or refrain, line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse
* Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound
* Chorus form, song in which all verse ...
. Chorus provides ADSL (up to 8/1 Mbit/s), ADSL2+ (up to 24/1 Mbit/s) and VDSL2 (up to 100/50 Mbit/s or 70/30 Mbit/s) services over the copper phone network.
Most connections are at full line speed, and although monthly data transfer caps used to be common, most plans are now unlimited.
As DSL is sensitive to distance, the closer the customer is to the equipment, the faster the connections. Chorus has implemented a
fibre-to-the-node (also known as "
cabinetisation") project to bring the
equipment
Equipment most commonly refers to a set of tools or other objects commonly used to achieve a particular objective. Different job
Work or labor (or labour in British English) is intentional activity people perform to support the needs and ...
closer to the user, so 91% of the population is able to access a DSL connection of 10Mbit/s or more. , 97.3% of phone lines are capable of accessing ADSL and 62.4% are capable of VDSL2.
Chorus' DSL footprint has shrunk considerably, due to migration to new FTTH networks operated by Chorus and other providers. DSL connections are down to 600,000 (from a peak of over 1.2 million in 2014).
Chorus cannot sell services directly to customers, instead, they wholesale services to internet retailers at regulated prices.
[VDSL2 pricing is not regulated.] In addition to ISPs being able to use Chorus' infrastructure, the copper loop is
unbundled, so operators like
Vodafone
Vodafone Group Public limited company, plc () is a British Multinational corporation, multinational Telephone company, telecommunications company. Its registered office and Headquarters, global headquarters are in Newbury, Berkshire, England. It ...
, Compass and
CallPlus CallPlus was a telecommunications company providing phone, calling, internet, mobile and advanced connectivity services to New Zealand businesses. Since 2016, CallPlus has been part of the Vocus Group, which is the third-largest telecommunications ...
(
Slingshot
A slingshot is a small hand-powered projectile weapon. The classic form consists of a Y-shaped frame, with two natural rubber strips or tubes attached to the upper two ends. The other ends of the strips lead back to a pocket that holds the pro ...
/
Orcon) can install their own
equipment
Equipment most commonly refers to a set of tools or other objects commonly used to achieve a particular objective. Different job
Work or labor (or labour in British English) is intentional activity people perform to support the needs and ...
at telephone exchanges and rent just the copper line from Chorus.
, 131,000 (8%) lines are unbundled.
Fibre
Fibre to the home is being rolled out to the urban areas of the country via the
Ultra-Fast Broadband
The Ultra-Fast Broadband initiative is a New Zealand Government programme of building fibre-to-the-home networks covering 87% of the population by the end of 2022. It is a public–private partnership of the government with four companies with ...
scheme (''see below''). The network is being constructed using
Gigabit-capable Passive Optical Networks (GPON) technology, which is reliable, comparatively low-cost and has been used in projects such as
Google Fiber
Google Fiber is part of the Access division of Alphabet Inc. It provides fiber-to-the-premises service in the United States, providing broadband Internet and IPTV to a small and slowly increasing number of locations. In mid-2016, Google Fiber ...
.
, the project is 74% complete, with fibre available to 1,103,874 users, of which 367,788 have signed up.
Residential plans are between 30/10 Mbit/s and 8000/8000 Mbit/s, with 8000 Mbit/s (8 gigabit) services currently available to approximately 150,000 premises in Auckland and Wellington. , there are 92 retailers of UFB services.
P2P fibre is available in business areas of the cities from several companies, including Chorus, Vodafone,
CityLink
CityLink is a network of tollways in Melbourne, Australia, linking the Tullamarine, West Gate and Monash Freeways and incorporating Bolte Bridge, Burnley Tunnel and other works. In 1996, Transurban was awarded the contract to augment two exi ...
and
Vector
Vector most often refers to:
*Euclidean vector, a quantity with a magnitude and a direction
*Vector (epidemiology), an agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen into another living organism
Vector may also refer to:
Mathematic ...
.
Cable
Vodafone has a
DOCSIS
Data Over Cable Service Interface Specification (DOCSIS) is an international telecommunications standard that permits the addition of high-bandwidth data transfer to an existing cable television (CATV) system. It is used by many cable televisio ...
3.1
hybrid fibre-coaxial
Hybrid fiber-coaxial (HFC) is a telecommunications industry term for a broadband network that combines optical fiber and coaxial cable. It has been commonly employed globally by cable television operators since the early 1990s.
In a hybrid fi ...
network covering parts of Kapiti, 85% of Wellington and almost two-thirds of Christchurch, a total of 145,000 homes. There are about 60,000 customers on the cable network.
It provides plans of 200/20Mbit/s and 1000/100Mbit/s.
Mobile
There are three physical mobile networks in the country.
Vodafone NZ
Vodafone New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications company.
It was a subsidiary of the London-listed company Vodafone Plc until 31 July 2019, when its sale to a consortium comprising Infratil Limited and Brookfield Asset Manageme ...
provides 2G and 3G coverage to 97.5% of the population, 4G LTE coverage to 96% of the population and
5G coverage in select locations.
Spark
Spark commonly refers to:
* Spark (fire), a small glowing particle or ember
* Electric spark, a form of electrical discharge
Spark may also refer to:
Places
* Spark Point, a rocky point in the South Shetland Islands
People
* Spark (surname)
* ...
provides 3G coverage to 97%, 4G to "over two-thirds". and 5G in select locations.
2degrees
2degrees is a New Zealand telecommunications provider. Its mobile network launched on 4 August 2009 after nine years of planning. 2degrees offers prepaid and pay-monthly mobile services as well as fixed-line phone and broadband services. 2degree ...
has a 3G network covering 96% of the population, with users roaming to Vodafone outside that area.
2degrees also has 4G LTE coverage to 86% of the population.
Fixed wireless
Vodafone offers a fixed wireless service provided over LTE/HSPA+ in rural areas under the government-subsidized Rural Broadband Initiative scheme. As a condition of the subsidy, Vodafone also wholesales this service to other retailers.
Vodafone also offers a fixed wireless service in urban areas with monthly plans up to 600GB over 4G and an Unlimited plan over 5G.
Spark (and low cost brand Skinny) also offer a fixed wireless service over 4G (5G is offered at no extra cost for eligible customers) in both urban and rural areas. Spark began moving low usage customers off copper connections onto the fixed wireless service in 2017. Spark and low cost brand Skinny offer an unlimited fixed wireless plan. As of Feb 2018 there were 104,000 customers on Spark's fixed wireless service.
Woosh offered a fixed wireless service in Southland until 1 July 2016. It used a proprietary TDD-CDMA technology by IP Wireless that was no longer supported by vendors. The maximum speed was 1.6Mbit/s.
There are Wireless Internet Service Providers (WISPs) covering regional rural areas, with about 40,000 customers. They typically use the unlicensed 2.4 and 5.8 GHz bands.
WISPA-NZ – or more fully the Wireless Internet Service Providers Association of New Zealand Inc – was established in January 2017. They received funding for expansion in August 2017 from the governments RBI2 program.
Satellite
Satellite broadband is available throughout the country from Farmside (using
IPSTAR), Wireless Nation (using
Optus D2
This is a list of the satellites operated by Optus, an Australian telecommunications company. The satellite communications facility is located at Belrose on Sydney's Northern Beaches. Optus' satellites are divided into 4 classes A, B, C and D. As ...
) and Gravity using JCSAT-3A (then Kacific-1 when launched in late 2019).
Dial-up
In 2018 dial up was less than 1% of all connections in NZ compared with 7% in 2012. In April 2017, Spark NZ announced plans to replace all Public Switched Telephone Network (PSTN) exchanges with new IP equipment within 5 years. Dial up will not be supported. In May 2018, Spark withdrew dial up services.
Government broadband upgrade plan
The government has two plans to bring fast broadband to 97.8% of the population by 2019.
Ultra-Fast Broadband Initiative
The Government is spending NZ$1.35 billion on public-private partnerships with Chorus and three local electricity network companies to roll out fibre-to-the-home connection in all main towns and cities with population over 10,000. The programme aims to deliver ultra-fast broadband capable of at least 100 Mbit/s download and 50Mbit/s upload to 75% of New Zealanders by 2019. In total, 1,340,000 households will be connected.
In 2015, the Government launched a $152 million to $210 million extension of the original UFB programme, with the aim of extending UFB programme coverage from 75 per cent to 80 per cent of New Zealanders.
Rural Broadband Initiative
The government has awarded a $300 million Rural Broadband Initiative (RBI) contract to Vodafone and Chorus to bring broadband of at least 5Mbit/s to 86% of rural customers by 2016.
Vodafone will install 154 new cell towers and upgrade 387 towers, adding 250,000 addresses to its 3G coverage. , 116 new towers have been installed and 314 towers upgraded, covering approximately 242,814 addresses.
, there are 6064 customers on the RBI wireless network. By January 2016, Vodafone was actively extending its 4G network, and on track to deliver speeds as high as 100Mbit/s. Chorus will provide fibre to the new Vodafone towers, 1040 schools, 183 libraries and 50 health providers. Chorus will also be upgrading or installing 1215 new cabinets to increase GPON, VDSL and ADSL coverage to 100,969 lines. , 93,348 lines have been upgraded, with an 80% uptake rate.
In 2015, in addition to expanding the coverage of the UFB programme, the government also launched a further $100 million investment to expand the RBI, and $50 million to improve mobile coverage in black spot areas.
In August 201
Crown Infrastructure Holdingsentered into contracts with the
Rural Connectivity Group and with a number o
Wireless Internet Service Providersto deliver the RBI2/MBSF programme.
Data caps
Monthly data caps used to be common in New Zealand, with over 90% of connections having caps in 2014. , less than 30% of internet connections now have a
fixed data cap.
Once users have exceeded their data cap, they typically have the option of having the speed limited to 64–128 kbit/s for the rest of the month or paying for any extra data used. Now, most RSP's (retail service providers) offer unlimited data plans. On average (August 2019), each household uses 265GB of data per month.
Most mobile phone data plans have set caps, with any excess paid for per MB (although extra data blocks can be purchased to avoid the expensive casual data pricing). As of 2014, Vodafone claimed its cellular data network is the fastest in the world, with downloads of 5 to 20 Mbit/s on 3G and 20 to 75 Mbit/s on LTE 4G being usually available. In April 2017, 2degrees announced unlimited data plans as part of a plan with unlimited calls and texts.
Internet service providers
, there were about 80 internet service providers. 16% had fewer than 100 customers, 41% had 101 to 1000 customers, 28% had between 1001 and 10,000 customers, 7% had 10,001 and 100,000 customers and 4% had more than 100,000 customers. 28% of ISPs wholesale bandwidth to other ISPs and 24% sell packages to other ISPs for resale.
In the first quarter of 2020, the ISPs with more than 1.0% market share (in brackets) were:
Spark
Spark commonly refers to:
* Spark (fire), a small glowing particle or ember
* Electric spark, a form of electrical discharge
Spark may also refer to:
Places
* Spark Point, a rocky point in the South Shetland Islands
People
* Spark (surname)
* ...
(including sub-brand Skinny) (40%),
Vodafone NZ
Vodafone New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications company.
It was a subsidiary of the London-listed company Vodafone Plc until 31 July 2019, when its sale to a consortium comprising Infratil Limited and Brookfield Asset Manageme ...
(21%),
Vocus Group
Vocus Group Limited, formerly known as Vocus Communications, is an international telecommunications company headquartered in North Sydney, Australia. Founded by James Spenceley as a wholesale, business, government and consumer telecommunicati ...
(including Slingshot and Orcon) (13%),
2degrees
2degrees is a New Zealand telecommunications provider. Its mobile network launched on 4 August 2009 after nine years of planning. 2degrees offers prepaid and pay-monthly mobile services as well as fixed-line phone and broadband services. 2degree ...
(7%), and
Trustpower
Manawa Energy Limited, formerly Trustpower, is a New Zealand electricity generation company that offers bespoke electricity products to commercial and industrial customers across New Zealand. Manawa Energy has 26 hydro-electricity schemes, with a ...
(6%).
Pricing
, three unlimited UFB plans can be purchased: NZ$79 per month for a 100 Mbit/s downlink and 20 Mbit/s uplink plan, NZ$99 per month for a 200 Mbit/s downlink and 20 Mbit/s uplink plan and NZ$129 per month for a 1 Gbit/s downlink and 500 Mbit/s uplink plan.
The
Commerce Commission
The Commerce Commission ( mi, Te Komihana Tauhokohoko) is a New Zealand government agency with responsibility for enforcing legislation that relates to competition in the country's markets, fair trading and consumer credit contracts, and regula ...
, which is responsible for telecommunications regulation, performed a comparison of broadband prices in New Zealand with prices in OECD and OECD-like countries. The data used is from June 2013.
98% of New Zealanders have access to affordable broadband, according to the
ITU
The International Telecommunication Union is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for many matters related to information and communication technologies. It was established on 17 May 1865 as the International Telegraph Unio ...
's measure of broadband costing less than 5% of average income.
With the increased competition in the broadband sector in New Zealand and the growing number of broadband plans and ISP's, 2016 saw the launch of a dedicated broadband comparison website in January 2016
glimpwhich was the first of its kind in New Zealand. Helping New Zealander's save time and money by providing the best deals for their needs. Followed by the launch o
Broadband Comparein June 2016.
History
Early days
By 1978 a national network had been established at the then
Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, abbreviated DSIR was the name of several British Empire organisations founded after the 1923 Imperial Conference to foster intra-Empire trade and development.
* Department of Scientific and Industria ...
(DSIR). This network linked the disparate campus "mainframes" around the country via PDP/11 and LSI/11 machines linked together over 9600bit/s "S2" circuits leased from the
New Zealand Post Office
The New Zealand Post Office (NZPO) was a government department of New Zealand until 1987. It was previously (from 1881 to 1959) named the New Zealand Post and Telegraph Department (NZ P&T).
As a government department, the New Zealand Post Office ...
. Due to the Telecommunications Act, the DSIR was not able to link all the research institutions together (
MAF Research, the
universities
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...
and other non-DSIR research institutions).
In the mid-1980s, with the advent of the Post Office's X-25 based packet switching network, and a degree of de-regulation, it became possible to link the various institutions together at a cost. In 1985 and 1986 a number of meetings were held by the various research institutions to plan for a broad-based research network that would provide basic research electronic communication (mail, file sharing and remote access). It was agreed to base this on the UK's Joint Academic NETwork (
JANET
Janet may refer to:
Names
* Janet (given name)
* Janet (French singer) (1939–2011)
Surname
* Charles Janet (1849–1932), French engineer, inventor and biologist, known for the Left Step periodic table
* Jules Janet (1861–1945), French psych ...
) "
Blue Book
A blue book or bluebook is an almanac, buyer's guide or other compilation of statistics and information. The term dates back to the 15th century, when large blue velvet-covered books were used for record-keeping by the Parliament of England. The ...
" standard rather than the US's
ARPANET
The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical fou ...
standard.
The push for development came from the DSIR (especially, the newly formed Division of Information Technology in 1985, Dr's Crouch, March, Nield and Whimp) and the Universities, in particular the
University of Waikato
The University of Waikato ( mi, Te Whare Wānanga o Waikato), is a Public university, public research university in Hamilton, New Zealand, Hamilton, New Zealand established in 1964. An additional campus is located in Tauranga.
The university perfo ...
and John Houlker. By 1987 everything was in place other than the last key component – international traffic. The controllers of funding were steadfast in refusing to fund the $250,000 estimate for the link up the Pacific to the United States. Due to the efforts of John Houlker, New Zealand's first international internet connection was established in 1989 from Waikato University through IBM. The capacity went from 64 kbit/s to 128 kbit/s between February 1993 and February 1994.
Free ISPs
At the start of the millennium, there were a number of ISPs offering free dial-up internet to users. Unlike free ISPs overseas, these did not rely on advertising or e-commerce revenue, but instead were funded by interconnection charges.
In 1996,
Telecom NZ and
Clear Communications
Clear Communications was a telecommunications company based in New Zealand. Until merging into Telstra's operations in 2001, it was the biggest rival to Telecom New Zealand.
Background
Prior to 1987, New Zealand's telecommunications sector ...
(until then only a toll-bypass provider) signed an interconnection agreement, where each would pay the other 2 cents/minute to terminate "local" calls, reducing to 1 cent/minute over several years. Telecom believed they had the upper hand, as (a) local calls were regulated to be zero-rated to the subscriber, and (b) they held the vast majority of subscribers to whom calls could be placed, and so expected a significant net inward revenue stream.
However when in 2000 Clear offered a revenue sharing arrangement to customers who signed on exclusively to ''receive'' calls, a number of ISPs were quick to take advantage of this offer. The first was Compass Communications, which set up Freenet in February 2000, followed quickly by i4free (by CallPlus), surf4nix, Zfree (by Clear itself), and Splurge (by
Quicksilver). They in turn could offer "free" dial-up internet to their customers, with Telecom ultimately footing the bill for "local" (free) calls.
The result was that Telecom wound up paying interconnection fees ''to'' Clear totalling tens of millions of NZ dollars.
These free ISPs had quite an impact on the New Zealand ISP market, cutting
Xtra
Extra or Xtra may refer to:
Arts, entertainment and media Film
* ''The Extra'' (1962 film), a Mexican film
* ''The Extra'' (2005 film), an Australian film
Literature
* ''Extra'' (newspaper), a Brazilian newspaper
* '' Extra!'', an American m ...
's market share by 10% during the time they were operative.
Within a few months Telecom remedied the situation by fiat: they declared that "internet calls" were not "local", and although they would still be free to the customer, they would no longer attract interconnection fees. To enforce this, all existing advertised phone numbers for dial-up services were blocked, and the ISPs were required to use new numbers starting with 0867.
(The legality of this decision was still before the courts as of 2010.) Clear stopped paying the ISPs, and they in turn shut down their "free" services. Zfree (Clear's own in-house ISP) was the last free ISP to shut down, in July 2002.
First broadband
In 1999 Telecom New Zealand began providing broadband internet (ADSL) under the name
JetStream
Jet streams are fast flowing, narrow, meandering air currents in the atmospheres of some planets, including Earth. On Earth, the main jet streams are located near the altitude of the tropopause and are westerly winds (flowing west to east) ...
. There was a progressive roll out into local exchanges. JetStream services were offered by many different ISPs, with Telecom billing for all data usage and the ISP charging for authentication and other services such as a static IP address. Home users were offered 'starter' plans at 128 kbit/s upload and download. Speeds greater than 128 kbit/s were extremely expensive and extra data (beyond the allowance) was charged at over $0.10 per MB. Telecom progressively introduced lower cost home options. Businesses were able to access 'full speed' services at up to 8 Mbit/s downstream and 800 kbit/s upstream, with data charges up to $0.20 per MB.
During March 2004 a 256 kbit/s home service was introduced with a 10 GB allowance for NZ$70.
In 2005 the government mandated Unbundled Bitstream Service (UBS) at a maximum upstream bandwidth of 128 kbit/s. This allowed ISPs to bill for their client's data usage. Telecom initially specified a 256 kbit/s downstream, but added 1 Mbit/s and 2 Mbit/s options later in the year. Telecom provided this in addition to the existing Jetstream plans.
In late 2005 Telecom cancelled its previous wholesale arrangements for JetStream and its plans with other ISPs. Only Telecom's own ISP,
Xtra
Extra or Xtra may refer to:
Arts, entertainment and media Film
* ''The Extra'' (1962 film), a Mexican film
* ''The Extra'' (2005 film), an Australian film
Literature
* ''Extra'' (newspaper), a Brazilian newspaper
* '' Extra!'', an American m ...
, could sell plans faster than the UBS options.
In February 2006 Telecom announced its intention to offer a speed upgrade on their wholesale. It was reported that some providers would likely reject the offer, though Telecom believed that negotiations were continuing well.
In April 2006, Telecom New Zealand introduced new cheaper services with download speeds up to 3.5 Mbit/s, some thought this was to avoid regulatory
local loop unbundling
Local loop unbundling (LLU or LLUB) is the regulatory process of allowing multiple telecommunications operators to use connections from the telephone exchange to the customer's premises. The physical wire connection between the local exchange and ...
. In May 2006 local loop unbundling was announced as part of a comprehensive telecommunications package.
Monopoly concerns
In the early 2000s, Telecom's control of telecommunications infrastructure was being criticised by lobby groups such as the Telecommunications Users’ Association of New Zealand and Internet New Zealand.
In early 2006, there were growing concerns about below par broadband in New Zealand. On the whole, Telecom's upstream speeds (128 kbit/s) and data caps had resulted in New Zealand's internet connections being ranked unfavourably compared to other countries in the
OECD
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD; french: Organisation de coopération et de développement économiques, ''OCDE'') is an intergovernmental organisation with 38 member countries, founded in 1961 to stimulate e ...
.
Competitors were making some changes such as offering higher data caps (XTRA's data caps averaged from 1 to 10 GB of data per month, while competitors such as ihug offered 40 and 60 GB options, or Xnet who offered free national data on their ADSL plans.) In mid 2006, Telecom still had control over the network including speeds and how much data they supplied each "UBS" customer.
Amidst growing pressure from the government, Telecom boosted downloads to 3.5 Mbit/s and uploads to 512 kbit/s (at high costs such as $20/month more just for increased upload speeds). Competitors and customers reported slower than expected speeds, with one ISP director criticizing Telecom's backhaul network. The new plans were also criticised for reducing the data caps on downloads.
Unleashing speeds
In May 2006, the government announced a comprehensive telecommunications package including unbundling of the local loop to allow other ISPs to compete more effectively against Telecom's DSL offerings.
The New Zealand Institute think-tank has estimated that the economic benefits of competitive broadband access could be worth as much as
NZ$
The New Zealand dollar ( mi, tāra o Aotearoa; sign: $, NZ$; code: NZD) is the official currency and legal tender of New Zealand, the Cook Islands, Niue, the Ross Dependency, Tokelau, and a British territory, the Pitcairn Islands. Within New ...
4.4 billion a year to New Zealand's gross domestic product.
On 26 October 2006, Telecom "unleashed" the download speeds on their network, meaning download speeds went as fast as the lines could go. Additionally, there was also an unlimited download plan, which was also uncapped, however 128kb upload, and a fair usage policy which is put in place to temporarily limit the speeds for customers who have high usage or make use of peer-to-peer connections via
traffic shaping
Traffic shaping is a bandwidth management technique used on computer networks which delays some or all datagrams to bring them into compliance with a desired ''traffic profile''. Traffic shaping is used to optimize or guarantee performance, improv ...
– basically limiting a so-called "unlimited" plan. This plan only lasted for a few months until it became clear that Telecom were restricting all traffic (not just peer-to-peer) during all times of the day (instead of the 8 peak hours per day stated). Because of this, all subscribers on the so-called "Go Large" plan were given a refund for up to 2 months worth of service, and the plan was eventually made no longer available to new subscribers.
In March 2007, Telecom started to introduce ADSL2+ into local exchanges through their roll-out programme.
Local loop unbundling and the structural separation of Telecom
The government mandated local loop unbundling in 2006, thus allowing other ISPs to set up their own infrastructure and services, and using only Telecom's existing copper wiring and exchanges.
Several countries have done similarly to compete more effectively with the incumbent's offerings. They also mandated
naked DSL
A naked DSL, also known as standalone or dry loop DSL, is a digital subscriber line (DSL) without a PSTN ( analogue telephony) service — or the associated dial tone. In other words, only a standalone DSL Internet service is provided on ...
and unconstrained UBS (which may see rapid changes in ISP offerings). Then Telecommunications Minister
David Cunliffe
David Richard Cunliffe (born 30 April 1963) is a New Zealand management consultant and former politician who was Leader of the New Zealand Labour Party and Leader of the Opposition from September 2013 to September 2014. He was Member of Parli ...
expected that the market would feel the effects from 2007 to 2009, with policy to be enacted commencing at the Budget in May 2006. As a part of the policy, the Government was to take steps to encourage private sector investment in improving rural telecommunications services, and to further open up the marketplace to alternative delivery media, such as
fibre optics
An optical fiber, or optical fibre in Commonwealth English, is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. Optical fibers are used most often as a means t ...
,
cable
Cable may refer to:
Mechanical
* Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof
* Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...
and
satellite
A satellite or artificial satellite is an object intentionally placed into orbit in outer space. Except for passive satellites, most satellites have an electricity generation system for equipment on board, such as solar panels or radioisotope ...
.
Telecom had a
monopoly
A monopoly (from Greek language, Greek el, μόνος, mónos, single, alone, label=none and el, πωλεῖν, pōleîn, to sell, label=none), as described by Irving Fisher, is a market with the "absence of competition", creating a situati ...
on the
local loop
In telephony, the local loop (also referred to as the local tail, subscriber line, or in the aggregate as the last mile) is the physical link or circuit that connects from the demarcation point of the customer premises to the edge of the common ...
for a long time. There were alternatives such as
CityLink
CityLink is a network of tollways in Melbourne, Australia, linking the Tullamarine, West Gate and Monash Freeways and incorporating Bolte Bridge, Burnley Tunnel and other works. In 1996, Transurban was awarded the contract to augment two exi ...
in the Auckland and Wellington CBDs,
TelstraClear
TelstraClear Limited was New Zealand's second-largest telecommunications company before being acquired by Vodafone New Zealand in October 2012, previous to which it was a subsidiary of Australian company Telstra.
It provided residential line re ...
's cable internet in
Wellington
Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
and
Christchurch
Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon River / ...
, satellite, and wireless in some locations – but products based on Telecom/Chorus's DSL were the norm, as other networks did not have the same coverage nor pricing the DSL network had.
In December 2011, Telecom NZ was split into a retail company (later renamed
Spark
Spark commonly refers to:
* Spark (fire), a small glowing particle or ember
* Electric spark, a form of electrical discharge
Spark may also refer to:
Places
* Spark Point, a rocky point in the South Shetland Islands
People
* Spark (surname)
* ...
), and
Chorus
Chorus may refer to:
Music
* Chorus (song) or refrain, line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse
* Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound
* Chorus form, song in which all verse ...
, a separate infrastructure company. Chorus completed a fibre to the node roll out in towns and cities with exchanges that have more than 500 lines in early 2012.
Vodafone NZ
Vodafone New Zealand Limited is a New Zealand telecommunications company.
It was a subsidiary of the London-listed company Vodafone Plc until 31 July 2019, when its sale to a consortium comprising Infratil Limited and Brookfield Asset Manageme ...
became Telecom's biggest competitor after acquiring ihug in 2006 and then acquiring TelstraClear in 2012. TelstraClear invested heavily in infrastructure throughout New Zealand by laying fibre networks in areas in
Wellington
Wellington ( mi, Te Whanganui-a-Tara or ) is the capital city of New Zealand. It is located at the south-western tip of the North Island, between Cook Strait and the Remutaka Range. Wellington is the second-largest city in New Zealand by me ...
,
Nelson
Nelson may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* ''Nelson'' (1918 film), a historical film directed by Maurice Elvey
* ''Nelson'' (1926 film), a historical film directed by Walter Summers
* ''Nelson'' (opera), an opera by Lennox Berkeley to a lib ...
, and
Christchurch
Christchurch ( ; mi, Ōtautahi) is the largest city in the South Island of New Zealand and the seat of the Canterbury Region. Christchurch lies on the South Island's east coast, just north of Banks Peninsula on Pegasus Bay. The Avon River / ...
. Vodafone continued to build a fibre backbone throughout New Zealand.
Recent developments
In June 2013, Google started testing
Project Loon
Loon LLC was an Alphabet Inc. subsidiary working on providing Internet access to rural and remote areas. The company used high-altitude balloons in the stratosphere at an altitude of to to create an aerial wireless network with up to 1 Mbit/s ...
in Canterbury, a plan to provide internet services via large helium balloons around the globe.
In mid 2015, Vodafone started upgrading its Rural Broadband Initiative network to 4G, while Spark also launched a rural 4G broadband service.
In July 2015, Woosh sold its customers in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch to Slingshot (owned by Australian company M2), leaving only its operation in Southland. The Southland operations ceased on 1 July 2016, after Woosh went into voluntary administration.
In October 2015, the Government announced an aspirational target that 99% of New Zealanders will be able to access broadband at peak speeds of at least 50 Mbit/s by 2025. The remaining 1% would get at least 10Mbit/s.
High-speed networks
Kiwi Advanced Research and Education Network
The Kiwi Advanced Research and Education Network (KAREN), now known simply as the REANNZ Network, is a high-capacity, ultra high-speed national research and education network (NREN) connecting New Zealand's tertiary institutions, research organi ...
(KAREN) was set up in 2006 to link universities and
Crown Research Institutes
In New Zealand, Crown Research Institutes (CRIs) are corporatised Crown entities charged with conducting scientific research.
Crown Research Institutes date from 1992, with most formed out of parts of the former Department of Scientific and Indu ...
within New Zealand via fibre-optic cable, with links to Sydney and Los Angeles via the
Southern Cross Cable
The Southern Cross Cable is a trans-Pacific network of telecommunications cables commissioned in 2000. The network is operated by the Bermuda-registered company ''Southern Cross Cables Limited''.
The network has 28,900 km of submarine an ...
, at speeds of up to 10 gigabits per second (or 1 gigabit per second to Los Angeles and Sydney).
Starting in 2013,
Chorus
Chorus may refer to:
Music
* Chorus (song) or refrain, line or lines that are repeated in music or in verse
* Chorus effect, the perception of similar sounds from multiple sources as a single, richer sound
* Chorus form, song in which all verse ...
ran a (now ended) ‘Gigatown' competition. Residents in Dunedin, the winning town, will get a
1Gbit/s connection at the price of a normal connection.
Weta Workshop,
Weta Digital and
Wingnut Films
WingNut Films, Inc. is a New Zealand production company based in Wellington, with other offices in Hollywood, United States, London, United Kingdom, and Melbourne, Australia. It is notable for producing and collaborates predominantly with filmm ...
in Wellington have high-speed links provided by
CityLink
CityLink is a network of tollways in Melbourne, Australia, linking the Tullamarine, West Gate and Monash Freeways and incorporating Bolte Bridge, Burnley Tunnel and other works. In 1996, Transurban was awarded the contract to augment two exi ...
.
International connections
Current
Most of New Zealand's current international connectivity is provided by three under-sea fibre optic cables with a combined total throughput of 73 terabits per second.
# The
Southern Cross Cable
The Southern Cross Cable is a trans-Pacific network of telecommunications cables commissioned in 2000. The network is operated by the Bermuda-registered company ''Southern Cross Cables Limited''.
The network has 28,900 km of submarine an ...
(10 Tbit/s) operated by Southern Cross Cables Limited was founded in 1997 by agreement between Telecom New Zealand (50%), Optus (40%) and MFS Globenet (10%) (subsequently acquired by WorldCom, and then Verizon Business). Southern Cross owns and operates a trans-Pacific submarine cable network connecting Australia, New Zealand, Fiji and Hawaii to the internet backbone on the United States West Coast.Completed in February 2001 has a current capacity of 5.4 Tbit/s. The network is 30,500 km in length, There are nine cable landing stations (two each in Australia, New Zealand, Hawaii and the US mainland, and one in Fiji) and additional access points in San Jose, Palo Alto, Los Angeles, and Seattle as well as Sydney. Both cables in the network contain six optical fibres (3 fibre pairs) between Sydney and Hawaii, and eight fibres (4 fibre pairs) between Hawaii and the US West Coast.
# The
Tasman Global Access (20 Tbit/s) was completed March 2017 and is 2288 km long with landing points in Ngarunui Beach, Raglan and Narrabeen Beach, Sydney Australia. The TGA cable is made from two fibre pairs and it has a current design capacity of 20 Tbit/s. TGA is owned by Spark NZ, Vodafone NZ and Telstra.
# The Hawaiki Transpacific Submarine Cable System (43 Tbit/s) came into service in July 2018. Hawaiki links Australia and New Zealand to the mainland United States, as well as Hawaii and American Samoa, with provision for connections to New Caledonia, Fiji and Tonga. The cable has two fibre optic pairs from the US to Australia, one pair from the US to New Zealand and one pair from New Zealand to Australia. The cable length is 15,000 km and has a capacity of 43.8 Tbit/s.
Historical
# The Tasman-2 was built in 1992 as part of
PacRimWest
PacRimWest was a twin-pair 560Mbit/s optical submarine telecommunications cable which served as Australia's main link to the world along with its partner cables Tasman2 (connecting Australia to New Zealand) and PacRimEast (connecting New Zealan ...
that covered the distance of 2,195 km with three fibre pairs, and with landing points in Sydney and Auckland. It had a capacity 1.2 Gbit/s.
# The company
Pacific Fibre
Pacific Fibre is a New Zealand-based company that proposed to build a trans-Pacific undersea communications cable that was to have competed with the Southern Cross Cable operated by Telecom New Zealand. The cable would have totalled 12,750 k ...
proposed another international cable between New Zealand and the United States, with claims in 2011 by one of the proponents
Sam Morgan that competition would cut international capacity costs, and result in more generous internet data caps. On 1 August 2012, Pacific Fibre announced they were unable to secure sufficient investment and the planned cable was discontinued. "I think it's tragic news for the New Zealand market", said Telecommunications Users Association CEO Paul Brislen. "We've spent millions of shareholder funds trying to get this done and despite getting some good investor support we have not been able to find the level of investment required in New Zealand initially and more broadly offshore", said Pacific Fibre chairman Sam Morgan.
Pacific Fibre will subsequently cease operations.
Internet exchange points
CityLink
CityLink is a network of tollways in Melbourne, Australia, linking the Tullamarine, West Gate and Monash Freeways and incorporating Bolte Bridge, Burnley Tunnel and other works. In 1996, Transurban was awarded the contract to augment two exi ...
operates
ExchangeNET, a network of neutral
Internet exchange point
Internet exchange points (IXes or IXPs) are common grounds of IP networking, allowing participant Internet service providers (ISPs) to exchange data destined for their respective networks. IXPs are generally located at places with preexisting ...
s throughout the country.
Censorship
The
Department of Internal Affairs
The Department of Internal Affairs (DIA), or in te reo Māori, is the public service department of New Zealand charged with issuing passports; administering applications for citizenship and lottery grants; enforcing censorship and gambling law ...
runs a voluntary internet censorship scheme. Both major ISPs Spark and Vodafone are members of the scheme.
See also
*
Information technology industry in New Zealand
*
.nz
.nz is the Internet country code top-level domain ( ccTLD) for New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean
The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five ...
*
New Zealand Internet Blackout
The New Zealand Internet Blackout was an online protest spearheaded by thCreative Freedom Foundation NZagainst changes to copyright law in New Zealand, most notably Section 92A of the Copyright (New Technologies) Amendment Act 2008, Copyright (N ...
*
New Zealand Network Operators Group
*
Pirate Party of New Zealand
The Pirate Party of New Zealand (PPNZ) was an unregistered political party in New Zealand. The party was based on the Swedish Pirate Party and focused on issues of copyright and patent reform and internet privacy. It contested elections in 2011 ...
*
Telecommunications in New Zealand
Telecommunications in New Zealand are fairly typical for an industrialised country.
Fixed-line broadband and telephone services are largely provided through copper-based networks, although fibre-based services are increasingly common. Spark New ...
Notes
References
External links
ISP lists
ISPmap
Maps
National Broadband MapChorus Network Capability MapGIS Geek map of cell towers and Chorus cabinetsTelecom New Zealand map of submarine cables connecting New Zealand and Australia
History
Down To The Wire
Connecting the Clouds – the Internet in New ZealandHill, Holes & PolesRural broadband
{{DEFAULTSORT:Internet In New Zealand