Activities

National Broadband Network

Information on current Communications Alliance activities related to the National Broadband Network.

More information on the initial Communications Alliance NBN Project (2009 – 2011) is available here.

A list of all Communications Alliance NBN-related publications can be found here

Current Activities

Communications Alliance – working with its Carrier and CSP members, nbn™, Vendor members and other members and Stakeholders – is engaged on a number of NBN-related operational projects.  These include:

WC53 NBN Access Transfer

Description

WC53 NBN Access Transfer Code revision

The NBN Access Transfer working committee is revising the C647:2017 NBN Access Transfer Industry Code to address the comments received during the review of the Code and to review the processes concerning invalid, unauthorised or repeat transfers.

Terms of reference here

Representatives

Aussie Broadband, Macquarie Telecom, nbn, Optus, Telstra, TPG Telecom, Vocus (ACCC and ACMA as observers).

Guideline Updated
In 2021 the G662 Guideline was revised to include additional protections for services which may be disrupted due to multiple service transfers. These include High Risk Services and Impacted Services that have been Reversed / Transferred with an aim to protect them from subsequent attempts to Transfer them  unless correct validation has occurred.

NBN Project History

The Rudd Government announced in April 2009 it would establish a new company that would invest up to $43 billion over eight years to build and operate a National Broadband Network delivering superfast broadband to Australian homes and workplaces.

This page contains links to older information on the National Broadband Network Project (2009-2011).

NBN Project (2009-2011)

As announced in September 2011, the Communications Alliance NBN Project was dissolved following the establishment of an Operations Council to guide and help manage the core operational activities of the Alliance.

Communications Alliance set up its NBN Project to assist the communications industry address requirements arising from the Government's policy on the National Broadband Network (NBN).

After initial industry forums in May and July 2009, seven different projects were identified to cover the various issues that need to be addressed.

The initial work and focus was on developing an NBN Reference Model to identify the roles and responsibilities of NBN Co and service providers in the NBN framework as well as identifying key principles related to end users, services and interconnection of networks. The NBN Reference Model provides the framework which informs and contributes to the other projects areas which cover specific aspects of the NBN.

The seven work areas addressed specific topics that required detailed work to identify standards, guidelines and processes for the delivery of wholesale and retail services in the NBN environment.  They were:

  • NBN Reference Model,
  • Wholesale Services,
  • Early Stage Deployments,
  • End User Premises,
  • Technical,
  • Operational, and
  • End User Migration.

Additional information on the NBN project is in a presentation given to stakeholders:
CA NBN Project briefing Dec09 (.pdf, 2249KB)

Communications Alliance Documents

Document releases created by the NBN Project working groups:

Other Communications Alliance documents for the NBN Project:

Past Key Dates

Submissions were due:

Past Key Announcements

Comments on National Broadband Network (NBN) related drafts

Below are received comments on the following NBN related drafts released by Communications Alliance

Click on the following links to jump to comments on the:

Draft NBN Reference Architecture - High Level Architecture Options for the NBN

Draft NBN Wholesale Service Definition Framework - Ethernet

Draft NBN Reference Architecture - High Level Architecture Options for the NBN

The public comment period for the draft (.pdf, 552KB) closed 06 November 2009.

Communications Alliance received submissions from:

Organisations

ACS Telecommunication Society of Australia (.ppt, 166KB)

Airspan Networks 1 (.doc, 31KB)

Airspan Networks 2 (.ppt, 6,900KB)

Arbor Networks (.txt, 5KB)

Brisbane City Council 1 (.doc, 29KB)

Brisbane City Council 2 (.doc, 30KB)

Cisco Systems (.pdf, 301KB)

Gibson Quai AAS Consulting (.ppt, 364KB)

Intelsat (pdf, 49KB)

Motorola (.doc, 599KB)

NBN Co (.pdf, 49KB)

Nortel (.doc, 774KB)

RSA (.pdf, 299KB)

Unico (.doc, 13KB)

ZTE (.pdf, 4,190KB)

Individuals

From Allan Horsley:

3.1.2 last dot point, second line: replace 'exchange site' with 'centre'

3.1.4 second dot point: replace 'subscriber' with 'end user' Table 1 (page 9, 3.2) POI Scenarios 1 and 2, POI Physical Locations: replace 'exchange' with 'centre'

Table 2 (page 11, 3.3) Broadband Access Provider, second dot point, first line: replace 'exchange' with 'centre'.

From Phil Harper:

Having read the NBN options paper, I would encourage you to keep in mind one important end user communication tool that is now emerging as a primary communication mode for deaf people in Australia - IP-based videophone / videocommunication.

Already commonplace in Scandanavia, Canada and the USA and emerging in Germany and France, a wired or wireless IP-based videocommunication tool (h.323 / SIP) are what Deaf people who use Auslan as their preferred 'telephone' tool. They will be able to call others via a Video Relay Service (available in Sweden, France & USA) and on trial here and NZ.

A minimum of an ADSL2+ connection is required for deaf people to use the videocommunication tool effectively - anything slower will creater jigger and delay because 'sign language' is being moved in video data packets as opposed to voice data.

Can you please add this to the list of "End devices" as listed in 3.1.1 and 4.1.1.1 (key functional components).

From Evan Stanbury:

1) Multicast Support Multicast replication is mentioned in 3.1.4 on the Service Edge, which is quite appropriate. I suggest that L2 Ethernet Multicast replication also has significant benefits when implemented in the Access Network (ie section 3.1.2, covering thousands of ONTs) and Aggregation Network (ie section 3.1.3, covering hundreds of Access boxes). There may be some smaller advantage in supporting multicast replication in section 3.1.1 for the ONT (covering a few RGs) and RG (covering a few Set-Top Boxes). All layers of the network must support mechanisms for multicast join and leave, so that the customer is able to control the multicast process.

From Teresa Pun:

Suggestion for consideration: Section 3 BB Network reference Architecture

  1. Convergence of smart meter and network Termination unit - rather than the traditional network termination unit and optical network termination unit, smart meter can serve as a termination unit. If the utilities metering information(multiple utilities) can be collected via one meter, through one network, the security and segregration of traffic will need to be built into the architecture.
  2. Convergence with the mobile network - mobile network has so far been a separate network with the fixed network, would the architecture provide evolutionary path for these two network to converge?
  3. User content and apps - looking into the future it is possible in the architecture that Apps/content will come also from the end user side. The network architecture design may need to take into account the potential volume of traffic from the user end.

From Peter Baehnisch:

“Special” consideration for the voice interface in the end user domain.

While the current NBN RA document mentions voice (especially in relation to the provision of a VOIP service) as part of the current draft, I believe there are two practical reasons why it needs special consideration over and above its generic inclusion with other Ethernet delivered services.

  1. There appears a likelihood that the deployment of fibre in residential locations may be accompanied by a concurrent removal of the copper pair based services to all homes in a street, irrespective of whether or not a particular end user takes a subscription service for “broadband” services. There may therefore be a significant (20% to 40%) proportion of customers to the NBN who initially only access a voice service.
  2. Classic practice for PONs providing analogue POTS services is for the interface to be mostly provided directly off the ONT, rather than off a retailer’s provided RG or device (such as an ATA).

These two considerations lead to the architecture where the analogue POTS interface is provided off the ONT by the NBN. This provides the simplest transparent POTS upgrade for a user transferring from a copper pair voice service to an NBN based voice service, with no need to install additional equipment inside the customer premises. The Wholesale POI becomes the analogue interface rather than an Ethernet or IP interface, and as such, isn’t currently mentioned in the draft, yet is probably significant enough that it needs to be covered.

Draft NBN Wholesale Service Definition Framework - Ethernet

The public comment period for the draft (.pdf, 568KB) closed 04 December 2009.

Communications Alliance received submissions from:

Organisations

Macquarie Telecom (.pdf, 68KB)

Motorola (.doc, 594KB)

NEC (.doc, 31KB)

Draft NBN Overview of Technical Standards

The public comment period for the draft (.pdf, 552KB) closed 12 March 2010.

Communications Alliance received submissions from:

Organisations

Nextgen Networks

PERSA

Standards Australia

VC International

Draft NBN Optical Access

The public comment period for the draft (.pdf, 552KB) closed 7 May 2010.

Communications Alliance received submissions from:

Organisations

Corning Cable Systems (.doc, 26KB)

Comms Alliance (.doc, 30KB)

Motorola (.pdf, 177KB)