More Australian homes and small businesses will soon have access to high-speed broadband after CEO Sol Trujillo today announced Telstra would activate high-speed ADSL2+ broadband at more than 900 telephone exchanges serving 2.4 million consumers across every state and territory.

The upgrade became possible after the Government made it clear it did not consider a compelling case had been made for regulating third-party access to the service – an assurance sought by Telstra for more than one year.

Telstra CEO, Sol Trujillo, made the announcement today in Canberra with the Prime Minister, the Hon Kevin Rudd MP, and the Minister for Broadband, Communications and the Digital Economy, Senator the Hon Stephen Conroy.

“The Government’s decision means that more than a million extra Australian families, businesses, non-profit organisations and government agencies will soon be able to enjoy the benefits of high-speed broadband in education, productivity improvements, entertainment and health-care,” Mr Trujillo said.

“This initiative provides the bandwidth families need so they can simultaneously use several devices at home – one parent can download work files, another can plan the family holiday online, while the kids are also online researching for school projects,” Mr Trujillo said.

How fast is ADSL2+ broadband?

High-speed ADSL2+ broadband can provide network speeds of up to 20 Megabits per second (Mbps) depending on factors including the distance of a user from the exchange. ADSL2+ can provide speeds of 12 to 20 Mbps to users within 1.5 kilometres of an exchange, and approximately 8 Mbps to users three kilometres from an exchange. These speeds are up to 350 times faster than a standard 56kbps dial-up connection, and up to 78 times faster than a standard 256kbps ADSL connection.