The release of NBN Co's strategic review puts the company on the path for a massive change in the rollout of the National Broadband Network (NBN), but the justification for the proposed changes have relied on a re-estimation of the current project. ZDNet has compared the new figures with those NBN Co prepared prior to the election.
Prior to the election, NBN Co was preparing a new corporate plan detailing the current state of the network rollout, and an indication of the expected cost for the network.
The table below contains the information contained in the leaked draft compared to the information NBN Co released today of the revised forecast and the new proposed NBN plan.
| 2013 draft NBN Co Corporate Plan | Post-election FttP Revised Forecast | New NBN plan | |
| Technology | 93 percent FttP | 93 percent FttP | 28 percent HFC; 24 percent FttP; and 41 percent FttN |
| Fixed-line premises passed by June 2016 | 3.5 million brownfield premises | 1.7 million brownfields premises | 1.3 million on FttP in total; 550,000 on fibre to the node; 2.6 million on HFC |
| Peak funding | AU$45.6 billion | AU$73 billion | AU$41 billion |
| Operating expenditure | AU$26.4 billion | AU$23 billion | AU$27 billion |
| Capital expenditure | AU$37.4 billion | AU$43 billion | AU$30 billion |
| Revenue at completion date | AU$21.7 billion | AU$10 billion | AU$18 billion |
| Completion date | December 2021 | June 2024 | 2020 |
| Download speeds | Up to 1Gbps on fibre; 25Mbps on wireless/satellite by 2021 | Up to 1Gbps on fibre; 25Mbps on wireless/satellite by 2024 | 43 percent to get 25Mbps by 2016; 91 percent to get 50Mbps by 2021; 65-75 percent to get 100Mbps by 2019 |
Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull has already moved to distance the government from the corporate plan prepared by NBN Co prior to the election, stating that the NBN Co strategic review found that staff and executives working on the project were overly optimistic in their assumptions.
Stay tuned to ZDNet for additional coverage of the NBN Co strategic review tomorrow.