Optus - The Network

Synopsis

The Optus Customer Access Network comprises a fibre and HFC network.

• The fibre network serves major business customers via Optus laid fibre in all capital cities, major suburban business districts and major regional centres, and also provides transmission capacity between the Optus network facilities (exchanges and fibre access nodes) and do many of Optus DSLAM sites.
• The HFC network is a wholly Optus owned network used for telephony, high-speed data and pay television to residential, non-business, customers.

Digital switching facilities have been constructed in major cities, with fibre optic cable linking these exchanges. The company also has satellite facilities. The company operates 4 mobile networks across Australia with 97% population coverage in 2011.

In 2011 Optus is moving ahead with technology updates to its networks. In late 2011 the company will trial 4G services using a trial 700MHz licence in Bendigo. Other 4G networks in the 1800MHz are set to commence in 2012 in NSW with further rollouts also planned.

Attracting businesses to use cloud-based services over the IP network have been launched and in early 2011 the company announced that a new satellite Optus 10 would be built and launched in 2013.

In this report we provide an overview of the company network operations – HFC, the mobile Open Network, fibre and satellite operations.

Companies mentioned

Companies mentioned in this report include – Telstra, SingTel, Exetel, AUSTAR, Woolworths, Pacnet, ONEmobile, Amaysim, People, M2, FOXTEL.

Hot topics and technologies mentioned

Hot topics and technologies mentioned include – ADSL, HFC, VoIP, VSAT, NBN, WiFi, HSPA, LTE, 4G, spectrum re-farming.

Table of Contents

• 1. Synopsis
• 2. Infrastructure overview
• 3. Consumer customer access network, the HFC network
  • 3.1 Overview
• 4. Fixed network
  • 4.1 Overview
  • 4.2 ULL DSL
  • 4.3 Core network
• 5. Mobile network
  • 5.1 The Open Network overview
  • 5.2 Femtocell service
  • 5.3 3G HSPA upgrades
    • 5.3.1 Moving to 98% population coverage
    • 5.3.2 HSPA+ for faster wireless broadband
    • 5.3.3 Metro 900MHz re-farming
  • 5.4 Long-term evolution (LTE) trials
    • 5.4.1 2010 trial
    • 5.4.2 Trials continuing in 2011
    • 5.4.3 4G 700MHz trial and commercial operations
  • 5.5 Optus/Vodafone 3G network sharing agreement
• 6. Wireless networks
  • 6.1 Optus Wireless Connect
  • 6.2 Radio
• 7. Wholesale activities
• 8. Digital media and cloud computing
  • 8.1 IPTV
  • 8.2 Businesses to save on capex and opex
  • 8.3 Google Apps for businesses
• 9. VoIP network
  • 9.1 Overview
• 10. Satellite networks
  • 10.1 Background info
  • 10.2 Overview
  • 10.3 Optus to manage interim regional and remote satellite services
  • 10.4 The Optus satellites
    • 10.4.1 Introduction
    • 10.4.2 Optus B3
    • 10.4.3 Optus C1
    • 10.4.4 Optus D1
    • 10.4.5 Optus D2
    • 10.4.6 Optus D3
    • 10.4.7 Optus 10
  • 10.5 The Earth stations
  • 10.6 Optus MobileSat
  • 10.7 Satellite broadband communities
  • 10.8 Satellite history to 2011
• 11. Related reports

• Table 1 – Optus Wireless Connect locations – 2011
• Table 2 – Optus Wireless Connect pricing – 2011

• Exhibit 1 – The SingTel Optus network
• Exhibit 2 – HFC network status
• Exhibit 3 – Overview of Optus satellites – key user statistics – 2011