Chorus network reaches new data peak at 1.33 Tbps

Chorus’ network hit its 2017 peak at 9.25pm on December 10 2017. The broadband network was delivering 1.328 Terabits per second.

Less than four weeks later it hit a new high. On January 4, at the same hour, the network was spitting out 1.33 Terabits per second. No doubt the record will soon broken again as numbers continue to climb.

Porirua people are New Zealand's most voracious data consumers. In December, the average Porirua household chewed through 202GB, that’s 34 percent up on a year earlier.

National average data consumption at 174GB a month

Nationwide average data consumption on the Chorus network climbed a similar amount. It is now 174GB a month. That’s up from 123GB a year ago.

Users with fibre accounts use more data than those with a copper connection. While the average monthly data base across the entire Chorus network is 174GB, customers with fibre use around 250GB.

In September, a Chorus forecast said this will climb to an average of around 680GB a month by 2020. In part the rise will come as more accounts move from copper to fibre.

Streaming television driving growth

The growth is largely about television moving from broadcast distribution to online, on-demand delivery.

Chorus network strategy manager Kurt Rodgers says it is not just the big international providers like Netflix driving this change. He says TVNZ and Three launched live streaming in 2017 and that has helped online television become mainstream.

Rodgers says people are watching on smart TVs, but they also watch on phones and tablets connected to home WiFi networks. He says phone handsets are used more often with WiFi than as traditional phones.

Broadband speeds on the Chorus network are also higher. Dunedin, which was the original Gigatown now has an average connection speed of 265Mbps. Rotorua is next on 72Mbps and Wellington is in third sport with 70Mbps. The national average across the Chorus network is 64Mbps.

Communications services flat as NZ IT spending rises to $12 billion

Research company Gartner says it expects the New Zealand technology products and services sector to climb 2.2 percent in 2018. It will rise from NZ$11.7 billion to a shade under $12 billion. This is close to the 2.5 percent growth expected in Australia, both countries are well behind Gartner's worldwide growth forecast 4.5 percent

Spending on software is set to see the biggest increase during the year. Gartner says spending on communications services is likely to repeat the recent pattern and post a modest increase of around one percent. In 2017 the market was worth NZ$4.37 billion, in 2018 this will rise to NZ$4.41. Gartner forecasts NZ$4.42 in 2019.

The research company includes consumer and enterprise fixed and mobile voice and data services in its communications services forecast.

Commerce Commission restarts backhaul study

The Commerce Commission says it is returning to its study of domestic backhaul services. This covers the national links between local exchanges and the core network.

Telecommunications Commissioner Dr Stephen Gale say he says backhaul as critical to effective broadband access; "especially with the rollout of ultrafast fibre broadband”.

The study aims to understand how backhaul services evolved and how demand for services may evolve in the future. It will consider if regulation could better protect consumer interests.

Although it first started in 2016, the study was put on hold in February 2017 when the government reviewed the Telecommunications Act. With that out the way, the commission thinks it's time to restart the study.

Twice as many NZ companies using Internet of things

Analyst company IDC says the number of New Zealand organisations that have implemented the Internet of Things has almost doubled. The number went from 14 percent in 2016 to 26 percent in 2017.

Research manager Monica Collier says its easier for managers to get a business case for an IoT project across the line as costs continue to fall.

IDC says New Zealand companies are more likely to use the IoT to improve customer experience than any other Asia-Pacific company. It also says WiFi remains the most popular way of connecting although low-power Wan is growing fast.

Hawaiki submarine cable project at halfway point

Hawaiki says more than half of the 15,000km of cable it is laying across the Pacific is now in place. The ship laying the cable is berthed in Auckland this week as it prepares for the New Zealand leg of the project. This will include laying cable to the landing station at Mangawhai Heads. The company says its cable will be in operation by June.

Chorus copper connections fall, fibre rises

Chorus says its fixed line connections fell by 23,000 to 1,559,000 in the last three months of 2017. The fall came as customers moved from copper services to fibre and fixed wireless. Of those lines, 20,000 were not used for broadband.

Fibre connections increased by 34,000 during the same period. The fibre network now reaches 343,000 premises.

Vodafone email woes

Writing for Business Day, Tom Pullar-Strecker reports Vodafone is not meeting its promise to forward mail to customers after the company pull the plug on its own service. The company says it has investigated and can't find evidence of a problem. Meanwhile Pullar-Strecker also has a story about Spark customers being deluged with spam after that company moved to a new mail provider.