NBN Co begins rollout of fibre-to-the-basement services

43 apartment blocks in NSW, Victoria and the ACT included in the first wave of FTTB services

Forty-three apartment blocks in in the ACT, New South Wales and Victoria will be the first to receive NBN Co's fibre-to-the-basement services.

The initial National Broadband Network FTTB rollout will cover some 6000 units, according to NBN Co documents

The first blocks of units to receive NBN FTTB services are located in Canberra; Brunswick and Brunswick East, Carlton, Keysborough, and Parkville in Melbourne; and central Sydney as well as Woolloomooloo, Darlinghurst, Rushcutters Bay, Elizabeth Bay, Potts Point, Balmain, Pyrmont, Randwick, Erskineville, Mascot, Alexandria and St Leonards.

In the past NBN Co struggled with the challenge of rolling out fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) to so-called multi-dwelling units (MDUs). FTTB services don't require running new cables to individual premises in MDUs.

Instead, the existing telephone wiring is used.

NBN Co's FTTB product will be made available to retail service providers (RSPs) in March. NBN Co intends to have some 2000 of the 6000 premises ready for NBN services by the end of March.

NBN Co has been conducting trials of FTTB services, with the government-owned company reporting average end user download speeds on vectored VDSL of 89 megabits per second, and average upload speeds of 36Mbps.

Telecommunications provider TPG announced earlier this month that it was temporarily suspending sales of its FTTB service.

TPG's decision came in the wake of a decision by Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull to impose a new licence condition on telcos that would force them to offer wholesale access on superfast broadband networks to rival ISPs.

Turnbull's move was a response to the outcome of an Australian Competition and Consumer Commission investigation that found TPG had not breached 'anti-cherrypicking' rules designed to protect NBN Co's business case.

Follow Rohan on Twitter: @rohan_p

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Tags broadbandNetworkingnational broadband networkNational Broadband Network (NBN)TPGfibre-to-the-building

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