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Telecom New Zealand

Telecom New Zealand's is the incumbant Telco of New Zealand, offering voice and data, wired and wireless.

Formed - 1996 by Telstra as part of Telstra's international expansion, initially focused on providing services to top tier international organisations who were already Telstra clients in Australia.

Employees - people in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch

Customers -

Retail Channels - own stores plus extensive dealer network across the country.

Services - residential and business lines, mobile, mobile broadband

Current Market Status

Telecom New Zealand was one of the first in the world to reveal its vision of a NGN rollout back in late 2004 and by late 2005, was expecting the first customers to be transferred to the new network by early 2007.

Fixed Line Voice

Growth in consumer VoIP services will impact traditional fixed-line services in New Zealand over the five years to 2010 as well as fixed-to-mobile revenues.

Fixed Line Broadband

Ongoing issues with broadband speed have resulted in major embarrassment for Telecom and charges laid by the Commerce Commission.

Mobile

With 3.5 million subscribers and a penetration level of around 86% towards the end of 2005, the country's mobile market was approaching saturation.

Telecom took an aggressive stance, and with some bold marketing tactics, made a significant gain over the past few years, to win back market share from Vodafone.

Mobile subscriber growth tapered off during 2006 and 2007, following an increase due to the marketing tactics.

Network & Services

Internet

TelstraClear owns two ISP's - Paradise.net and Clear Net. Both offer nationwide dialup and DSL service, and cable modem internet access within TelstraClear's own (built) network. Capable of speeds up to 10mb/s this makes it New Zealands fastest Home broadband offering. Outside of this network, broadband connections are resold over Telecom's DSL lines.

Mobile

Uses Telecom CDMA

TelstraClear previously acted as a major reseller for Vodafones network, using their own 029 prefix. This agreement ended in 2007 - the 30,000 TelstraClear mobile customers scheduled to be returned to Vodafone.

Subsequently TelstraClear signed a wholesale mobile deal to access the Telecom New Zealand CDMA network now offering this new service to Small Medium Enteprises and Small Business.

International

Points of presence in London, Frankfurt, Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Tokyo, Sydney, Melbourne, Auckland and Wellington

The International voice network is connected using the latest cable and satellite technologies.

Calls are routed via direct and other high-quality connections – with some services providing next-generation technologies such as soft switches and voice-over internet protocol (VoIP), enabling faster, higher quality terminations.

Real-time traffic management is provided through 24x7 monitoring by a team of technical specialists and real-time traffic management tools.

Specialists optimise routing to ensure continuity and call quality.

An online reporting system provides the latest information on pricing, billing and traffic, enabling customers to track their account activities.

Development

2005 - the network was upgraded to a fully digital transmission network.

2004 - TelstraClear began offering residential line HomePlan services including broadband outside those areas where it has its own network, reselling a wholesale product from Telecom New Zealand.

Business Divisions

In 2007 the NZ Government regulatory body announced that to provide a more competitive telco platform in New Zealand, Telecom must split its operations into three distinct business units - Retail, Wholesale and Chorus.

Telecom Consumer

Responsible for fixed line services, mobile and Xtra internet services.

Telecom Retail Services

Responsible for Telecom fixed line, mobile and internet services for consumer and small / medium business markets.

Chorus

Chorus business unit managing Telecom's local access network in New Zealand. It also operates the national field services group.

Chorus will lead innovative developments such as access fibre and Telecom's 'cabinetisation programme' to deliver high-speed broadband to New Zealanders in all towns with 500 lines or more.

“Chorus will give all service providers equal access to the local network
through its exchanges, and take the lead on significant developments like
access fibre and Telecom’s cabinetisation programme. This programme will deliver high-speed broadband to New Zealanders."

“Chorus also represents the culture we want to build with our customers
and within our organisation.”

“We are committed to a collaborative way of doing things and look forward to working together with the industry, central and local government and all telecommunications companies to bring better services to all New Zealanders.”

Chief Executive - Mark Ratcliffe

Telecom Wholesale

Telecom Wholesale is an operationally separate business unit that delivers next generation wholesale network connectivity products to service providers throughout New Zealand. Its broadband, business data, voice and interconnect products give wholesale customers the foundation on which to build their own network or telecommunications services for their end-users.

Wholesale Roadmaps

Wholesale Products

Gen-i

Provides converged technology and telecommunications solutions for Telecom's business customers across New Zealand and Australia. Gen-i has a team of more than 2,000 people who are among the most highly skilled and experienced ICT integrators in Australasia.

AAPT PowerTel

AAPT-PowerTel is Telecom's Australian subsidiary and third largest telecommunications provider in Australia. Telecom acquired PowerTel Limited in 2007 to leverage its investment in service capability, and to bring more customers onto the combined access network.

The transition did not go well, and problems still abound for the company. Analysts are still a little puzzled as to why to poorly performing AAPT acquired the equally poorly performing PowerTel. A last ditch madness by departing CEO Theresa Gattung perhaps?

Telecom New Zealand International

Telecom New Zealand International provides the full range of telecommunications services to retail and wholesale customers including data, voice, and mobile services into the Asia-Pacific region.

Key Strategies

Separation

Telecom appears to be co-operating with regulatory bodies to reinvigorate the telecommunications market by reducing its monopoly status. With Paul Reynolds previous BT experience, it would be wise to continue towards this goal, and quickly resolve some of the industry issues in relation to UBS.

Aquisitions & Mergers

2006 - Vodafone purchased ihug, New Zealands third largest Internet service provider.

Strategic Partnerships

Woosh Wireless

Woosh provide a broadband wireless services to key areas in New Zealand.

Key Media Comments

Marko Bogoievski Departure

The proposed reason for the recent depature of TNZ finance chief Marko Bogoievski was that he did not agree with the way the company’s board accepted the New Zealand Government’s bid for strong internal separation.

He reportedly said "shareholders would be better off with full separation - spinning off the network and wholesale business into a separate company either by sale to an infrastructure manager or the creation of a new listed company". His feelings were based on the fact that shareholders get all the downside of more regulation and no upside for a sale of excellent assets.

Updates on Telecom New Zealand

Telco Profiles Index | Global | Australia | New Zealand