30,000 get naked with iiNet

Australia's third-largest internet service provider iiNet today said it had signed up more than 30,000 local customers to its naked DSL service and more than 80,000 to its internet telephony offering.

iiNet and some of its rivals started offering the next-generation technologies in the past several years as part of a challenge aimed at sapping customers away from larger and more traditional telcos such as Optus and Telstra, which prefer customers to buy packages of telecommunications services including both broadband and traditional fixed-line telephony.

In total iiNet had 373,482 DSL broadband subscribers at 30 June 2008, including more than 140,000 it picked up with its recent acquisition of fellow Perth ISP Westnet, which broadly runs independently of iiNet. In total iiNet still had 101,333 dial-up internet subscribers, and a small number on satellite broadband.

The details were released today as part of iiNet's financial results for the year ended 30 June. In general iiNet had a year of moderate growth, with total revenues rising 9.29 per cent to $243.19 million for the period, and net profit after tax shrinking from $23.25 million to $19.9 million.

The company said it had $24.7 million in cash flow to invest in future opportunities. Over its history iiNet has swallowed a large number of smaller ISPs.

In its statement to the Australian Securities Exchange, iiNet said it would launch ADSL2+ services under the Westnet brand, but not naked DSL (where broadband is sold without an attached phone line) or internet telephony (VoIP or Voice over IP).