Chorus has unveiled a new set of commercial and copper fibre products, branded Chorus Accelerate, which it claims will be driven by a multi-million dollar investment in its core infrastructure.
The infrastructure investment includes the purchase of the Alcatel-Lucent 7950 Extensible Routing System (XRS), a 16 terabit per second (Tbps) network switch, which will be used to manage the high growth in bandwidth demand the company is experiencing, as well as the capacity required to support Accelerate.
Chorus is marketing Accelerate as “an integrated portfolio of products” which promises greater speeds, enhanced high definition video capability, more choices for the telecommunications industry and a “clear path to fibre.”
Chorus chief executive officer (CEO), Mark Ratcliffe, said the new products are based on customer feedback.
“We know that our customers have been asking us for greater speeds, products that give them the confidence to market value-added HD video services, more choices and better value.”
Accelerate will be segmented into Fibre 100, Fibre 200, and Fibre Business; the products are based on 100 megabit per second (Mbps), 200Mbps, and 1 gigabit per second (Gbps) download speeds, respectively, and are priced from $40 per 100Mbps down and 20Mbps up connection.
Chorus said Accelerate products will be “slightly over-specified” for their respective speeds.
Wiping the rust
The introduction of Accelerate is being coupled with what Chorus calls “boosted copper”; the broadband infrastructure company is launching Boost HD and Boost VDSL copper products.
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Boost HD, priced from $44.98 wholesale until December 1, comes with a “service commitment that there will be enough bandwidth available in the Chorus network that the services Chorus provides to its industry customers will allow for a HD video stream at all times.”
The VDSL-based Boost VDSL includes a “fibre ready” installation that will get the wiring within a property ready for fibre for easier upgrade once fibre is available. It will be priced at a wholesale rate of $49.98.
About 90 per cent of Chorus broadband-capable lines will be compatible with Boost HD, while 60 per cent will be Boost VDSL capable.