Marshall Place Associates Live More of Your Life

Fast broadband’s promise

Proposals to improve Australia’s broadband network – either by building the new,
independent network proposed by Opposition Leader Kevin Rudd, or the
more limited city, then regional plan put forward by Communications
Minister Helen Coonan – could mean every Australian home and small
business could be wired into the world.

Rudd has forced the entire community to recognise that information and communication
technologies (ICT) cannot be delayed until the market is ready to take
up the responsibilities of creating a national system. And that it is
not good enough to have system that is OK for the affluent in the
capital cities and leaves the rest of the nation praying for an end to
the physical and the information drought.

Elsewhere in the world it has long been recognised that high-speed broadband access at
reasonable prices for both uploading and downloading provides an
essential platform for economic development, small business formation
and job creation.

In a broadband world, business is open 24/365, doesn’t need multiple lines for different parts of their
business operations, can communicate with VoIP, can manage supply and
ordering at the click of a mouse, does not face conflicts and delays in
international financial funds transfers and payment systems, and can
work at home, in the shop or office or even on the golf course via 3G
networks.

Just a few of the integrated systems that become affordable as part of an integrated small business network include:

• Fast effective websites.
• Business co-operatives.
• Buying groups.
• Online ordering.
• Purchase and billing systems.
• Electronic tendering.
• Reduced
  travel and trading costs allowing increased productivity through
  reduced staff, overheads, market research and regulatory interference

At present, research conducted by the Roy Morgan Research Centre shows how
far we have lost the plot while we went through more than a dozen
attempts to monster Telstra into agreeing to give a free ride to its
competitors.

In the UK seven out of 10 small-business owners have access to high-speed broadband resources and nine out of 10 have internet connections to their home for home-based businesses. In
the US, half of the small-business owners have high-speed broadband
access and eight out of 10 have internet access for their home-based
businesses.

In Australia we have less than one in 10 able to afford leased high-speed broadband and less than 10% having
internet supports for their home business.

In Northern Ireland 100% of the population has high-speed broadband for both home
and business because its government recognised that this was necessary
to give their nation a comparative advantage.

As Terry McCrann said in the Weekend Australian
on March 24: “It appears disturbingly that the Government’s lazy
incompetence has already passed up the chance for some creative
investment.”

What does this mean for small business??

We can best learn about the future by looking at what is already happening
in Northern Ireland, where total national coverage of high-speed
broadband is giving it a competitive edge over the Republic of Ireland.

Every small business has access to faster and cheaper web-surfing for
business opportunities, instant order and confirmation email systems,
quicker business transactions and access to comparative pricing,
reliable software that is nationally linked to suppliers and consumers
and an end to frustrating dial-up and fragmented service coverage.

What was previously the preserve of only the large companies and the
affluent business owner is now instantly accessible by start-ups and
home-based businesses alike.

The costs that apply for everyday business can be dramatically reduced in an Australia held
hostage for the release of high-speed broadband by the national
monopoly player and a recalcitrant government’s regulatory body.

We are faced with a disjointed, fragmented information system with
variable access, variable IT suppliers, conflicting technologies, slow
speed of support and arrogant technical support from some providers.

Australia remains at the bottom of the pile of sophisticated business
communication systems until we demand better and expect to get what is
already available in Northern Ireland today at a fraction of the cost
of almost any one of the separate services

No more hours spent fighting the telephone computer substitutes for human service,
separate on-line ordering systems tied to individual financial
institutions, separate systems for stock control and accounting records
and another for customer relationship marketing and management

It comes down to this: any business, no matter what its size, has regular
communication with homes, business and government contacts (B2B, B2C
and B2G become blurred into one reality) at 40 times the speed we can
do in Australia and at a fraction of the cost.

Suppliers, marketers and distributors all share the one system with common
definitions, product and service images and direct interaction on
contracts and fulfilment. Anytime that a customer – even from the other
side of the globe in a different time zone – makes an enquiry or places
an order, it gets sorted, sent and billed without the hassle of many
call charges, software clashes or credit identity delays.

Efficient information age infrastructures enable small business to compete on a
global basis and make direct contact with enterprise around the world,
wherever high-speed broadband enables more efficient data processing,
banking, insurance, management and technical consulting, travel
planning, business logistics and customer relations management.

The results are already in for countries such as Ireland, Iceland, Denmark,
Belgium, Hong Kong, Korea, the Netherlands and Canada, to name but a
handful of countries that have seen the potential for new growth
opportunities to be gained from commitment to an entry to the 21st
century

As Rob Frieden from Penn State University states in his study of lessons to be learned from Broadband Development in Canada, Japan and Korea: “The acquisition of comparative advantages in
ICT development appears impossible without some degree of government
involvement.

“No matter how attractive ‘blue sky’ technologies appear on the horizon, governments may need to jump-start
new technology adoption and thereby accelerate the accrual of a
critical mass needed to achieve scale economies and the ability to
offer serves at rates a mass market will support.”