Monarto South-based draftsman Steve Bown has received a business lifeline from the high-speed Internet service delivered to his rural home office by national broadband trailblazer Internode

Until mid 2006, Mr. Bown relied on dial-up Internet access to exchange multi-megabyte detailed construction drawings with his customers, steel fabricators throughout South Australia. Monarto South is a largely rural area, about 65 km south east of Adelaide.

Bown Contracting & Drafting owner Mr. Bown said the slowness and unreliability of dial-up Internet access was threatening his business. “When I was on dial-up, customers were starting to ask ‘how can we use you if you don’t have broadband?’” he said.

 “In just the past 18 months, broadband is so widely used in the cities, that there is an expectation that everyone has it. Clients were no longer compressing files. They were using broadband, so they expected an immediate response. I could still run the business, but it was embarrassing not to be able to perform to the level that people expected

“Sometimes I would make a 50km return trip to Murray Bridge to collect large files on my flash drive from a friend’s broadband service because it was quicker that downloading it with dial-up.

“This was one of the biggest penalties to running a business in the country.”

However, that changed in June 2006. Since Internode set up a wireless broadband service near his 45ha property, Mr. Bown has seen his business revived by the speed of broadband communication that many city people take for granted.

Mr. Bown said he could now download 5MB files in seconds. “It is totally amazing what Internode has been able to do for us,” he said.

“To manage projects, drawings are often stored on a central service. I log on to it when I want to download them, like checking them out of a library, and then I return them after my work is completed. I tried to use one service, called Aconex, when I was on dialup, but, without broadband, it was hopeless.

“Now it is irrelevant to customers where I am located. My broadband service runs at over 2 megabits per second, which is faster than most city services, so my business is both more efficient and profitable.”

Mr. Bown is just one of the beneficiaries of Internode’s multi-million-dollar investment in delivering broadband services into rural and remote areas of Australia. The company last year completed providing almost total broadband coverage of the Coorong, an 8800 sq km region near Adelaide.

To use Internode’s broadband service, Mr. Bown uses a Billion router which connects by cable to a radio on a 7m tower near his house. This communicates with a solar-powered microwave mast that provides broadband services for a number of other nearby properties.

Mr. Bown’s wife, who runs a home-based garment manufacturing business, has also benefited from the broadband service which allows outgoing Voice over Broadband calls to occur at the same time as a call is coming in on the same telephone line.

Mr. Bown said access to broadband in rural areas would create new economic development opportunities. “It allows people to stay working in the country rather than move to the city for a job,” he said.

“That’s the reason so many country kids pack up and leave. With broadband, local businesses have a chance to be competitive with city-based businesses and to create more jobs locally.”

About Internode www.internode.on.net

Internode is an Internet age carrier committed to using broadband technology to redefine the national telecommunications environment. The Australian-owned company is a trailblazer that delivers the cost and convenience of broadband telecommunications to individuals and businesses throughout Australia. 

For media assistance, call John Harris on (08) 8431 4000 or email This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .