Telco widens its coverage

Optus to add eight towers

OPTUS has pledged to widen its Tasmanian mobile network coverage by committing to build eight more towers across the state.

Optus chief executive Allen Lew, who announced the $4.5 million investment from the telco’s flagship Elizabeth St store this morning, said the company sees Tasmania as a growth opportunity and aims to “bring effective competition” to the state.

“Competition is not only good for the economy, but also good for the customer with these new sites providing customers with choice and better value,” he said.

The towers will be built at Cradoc, Magra, Salamanca Place, Austins Ferry, Campania, Romaine West (near Burnie), Jericho East and Doctors Rocks (near Wynyard).

The company also said it had completed the installation of 37 new mobile towers across the state 12 months ahead of schedule, taking the total number of Optus sites in Tasmania to 151.

“We’re fully committed to Tasmania,” Mr Lew said.

“We believe this investment will help us increase our market share and engagement with the Tasmanian community.

“Our market share here is below our national average and we know the reasons for that — you can’t get market share without making that commitment of investment.”

He said while Tasmania could be a challenging place to provide mobile coverage, customers in metro and regional areas should have access to the same network services as the mainland.

He said as the company’s network expanded there were certainly opportunities to employ more Tasmanians.

Mr Lew also addressed the company’s World Cup streaming failures and believes Australians would forgive them for the “mishap”.

“We know what caused it, we’ve effectively rectified it … and I’m glad to say we’ve just gone through the first weekend of English Premier League a few days ago very well,” he said.

Businessman Derrick Clack, owner of Howrah Plumbing, switched to Optus from Telstra in July 2017 and said there’s no difference to coverage in 90 to 95 per cent of the locations where his company does work.

“I remember Optus from eight years ago in Tassie and it’s not the same, this investment has made a huge difference, it’s a viable alternative now,” he said.

The eight towers are expected to be completed by March next year.