B U S I N E S S S T O R Y

Xtra undercutting feared

20 September 2006 By TOM PULLAR-STRECKER

A row is brewing over Telecom's plan to announce low-priced "unconstrained" broadband plans next week.

Rivals say the plans could undercut the price they pay to Telecom for wholesale broadband connections, making them uncompetitive, and they may ask the courts to stop the Telecom launch.

The new Telecom plans will offer Xtra customers download speeds of up to 7.6 megabits per second.

The plans, which will be available from late next month, are likely to benefit city-dwelling Xtra broadband customers.

Internet service providers that wholesale Telecom broadband connections, however, fear they will not be able to compete. An industry source said ISPs were meeting to discuss tactics and would consider a legal challenge.

...

Technology partner Alcatel warned in July that improvements would be enjoyed only by customers close to telephone exchanges, with up to 160,000 in outlying areas potentially experiencing a drop in average connection speeds.

Interesting news indeed, i doubt the internet speeds will go up that much in practicality, i barely ever get 3.5 megabits anyhow. I wonder if upload will be unconstrained at all.

Fair call to the other ISP's for taking telecom to task about this.

[Moderator edit (MF): removed part of quote. Please read full article on stuff. Fair Use in action]