Australian National Broadband Network to spend $1 billion on satellites

The NBN Co will spend up to $1 billion on two KA band satellites to deliver National Broadband Network (NBN) services to Australian households unable to access coverage via fiber or wireless.

The plan, announced at the Committee for Economic Development of Australia's (CEDA) recent 2010 ICT Review conference in South Australia by NBN Co chief executive officer, Mike Quigley, will see two satellites launched to deliver around two per cent of the total capacity of the NBN. "We will cover the whole country with satellite," he said. "The fact is even within 40 or 50 kilometres of Sydney and Melbourne there are places you can only get to with satellite. Fibre is too difficult to get to them and the terrain is such that you just can't get propagation of the wireless signal effectively and get a reliable service." Outlining the plans for satellite services under the NBN, Quigley said the decision to spend up to $500 million each on two satellites was prompted by a current lack of viable satellite services.