Even as OPEL finalises its nation-wide WiMAX rollout and the Federal Government teeters on its FttN plans for regional Australia, newly appointed wholesaler for the IPSTAR satellite, ETT Limited, remains firm in its belief of becoming a serious regional broadband provider.

Having signed on as IPSTAR’s exclusive National Service Operator on January 1, ETT plans to first target the one to two percent of regional Australians that are out of reach of fibre and wireless infrastructure before moving on to more populated areas.

With both OPEL and the Federal Government on the verge of finalising their respective regional rollout plans it may seem like an odd time to be moving into regional supply of broadband, but ETT executive director Larry Shutes, believes now is as good as time as any.

“The fact is, our product is in regional Australia right now, providing broadband to people that the big Telcos can’t get to,” Shutes said. “We will be working on the one to two percent of the population that will never be covered by fibre because these are areas of the market where we know we can operate.”

ETT is hoping to grow the 25,000 customer base it inherited from IPSTAR by targeting the 300,000 people represented in the "extreme" regional two percent of the country.

Looking beyond this market, ETT will also target traditional regional Australia, a market that Shutes described as “anywhere outside of a major city.”

“If OPEL or the Labor Government’s new scheme goes ahead, there will be a year of planning and then a year of building. So in the least we will have two years to build a strong base of customers,” he said. “People aren’t aware they can get a commercial grade broadband service from satellite but we can and we’re here.”

The satellite broadband service provided by ETT is capable of up and downstream speeds of 2Mbps and offers absolute coverage of the Australian landscape, Shutes said.