Martin Kovacs

It additionally found that advanced level businesses are seven times more likely to be exporting than basic level businesses and 14 times more likely to be innovating.

Businesses with advanced levels of engagement are also earning 1.4 times more revenue per employee, while having a more diversified customer base, according to the report.

“There are significant benefits to be gained for SMBs with each step up the digital engagement ladder, and across all industries, sizes and geographies, with revenue growth almost 20 per cent higher for each upward step,” Deloitte states.

Based on a national survey of over 600 Australian SMBs, the report found that 23 per cent of SMBs are at a basic level of digital engagement, 34 per cent are at an intermediate level, 34 per cent are at a high level and 9 per cent are at an advanced level.

“SMBs are major contributors to the Australian economy,” Deloitte Access Economics partner John O’Mahony commented. “In 2014-15, they contributed $608 billion in GDP, representing over half of private sector economic activity, and employed more than 7.2 million people.

“Engaging with, investing in, and then keeping up with digital in an increasingly digital economy, opens up significant new opportunities for SMBs in terms of agility, competitive advantage, innovation and growth.

“But the digital landscape is also continually evolving as new technologies change existing markets, drive increased competition and shift consumer expectations. The goalposts when it comes to being highly digitally engaged continue to shift.”

O’Mahony noted that while, in areas such as social media, e-commerce, websites, online marketing tools and data analytics, SMBs are becoming more digitally capable, despite the benefits identified, “almost half of all SMBs at lower levels of engagement don’t regard digital tools as relevant for their business”.

“This suggests that there is still work to be done in helping some understand the value associated with increased digital engagement,” he commented.

ACMA chairman Chris Chapman, whose 10-year tenure at the head of ACMA concludes at the end this week, noted that the need for accommodation of “growth in mobile broadband traffic has been one of the greatest challenges for the ACMA, and indeed all spectrum regulators worldwide”.

“The strategy signals a shift towards greater reliance on a contingency planning model, where the regulator plans for a range of potential outcomes in terms of mobile broadband capacity growth, but still seeks to enable the right spectrum to be made available – at the right time – depending on the scenarios that are unfolding,” Chapman commented.

“The key to such a contingency planning approach is the ability of the regulator to work with industry and the international community on a range of potential candidate bands at the same time, often over the very extended periods that are required for the development of new, harmonised spectrum uses and subsequent changes in the highest value use of those bands domestically.”

ACMA states the change in approach is intended for it “to be more flexible and responsive to the rapidly changing spectrum environment”, while in place of rigid quantitative targets, a more dynamic approach has been adopted in identifying and planning of spectrum for mobile broadband.

“The work plan provides an important indication of our forward action plans,” Chapman commented.

“This will include immediate work on the 1.5 GHz band identified for mobile broadband at last year’s World Radiocommunication Conference, as well as pressing on with the reconfiguration of the 900 MHz band.”

Additionally, just 34 per cent of the respondents stated that they believe their organisations accurately track the number of IoT devices on their networks.

“The Internet of Things presents a clear weak spot for an increasing number of information security organisations,” Tim Erlin, Tripwire director of IT security and risk strategy, commented.

“As an industry, we need to address the security basics with the growing number of IoT devices in corporate networks. By ensuring these devices are securely configured, patched for vulnerabilities and being monitored consistently, we will go a long way in limiting the risks introduced.”

The survey also found that 78 per cent of respondents are concerned about the weaponisation of IoT devices in the use of DDoS attacks, while 47 per cent expect the number of IoT devices on their networks to increase by at least 30 per cent in 2017.

Meanwhile, only 11 per cent of the respondents consider DDoS attacks one of the top two security threats their organisations face.

“It wasn’t so long ago that home computer ‘zombie armies’ were the weapon of choice for a lot of cyber-attacks and denial of service attacks,” Dwayne Melancon, Tripwire chief technology officer and vice president of research and development, commented.

“It seems that security professionals see IoT devices as a sort of ‘zombie appliance army’ that’s worthy of great concern. That makes sense, since many of the current crop of IoT devices were created with low cost as a priority over security, making them easy targets.

Upon its launch, NBN stated it expected a simpler installation process compared to other technologies such as fibre-to-the-premises (FTTP) will see it able to activate end users “much faster than on other broadband technologies”.

However, Clare has questioned why there is even a debate between the use of copper and fibre, stating “fibre is the end game”.

“Decades from now, I am sure we will look back and wonder what this debate about fibre and copper was all about,” he told CommsDay attendees.

“And that’s because the network we will be using will be essentially a fibre network. Fibre-to-the-node will be gone. It’s not a question of if this will happen. It’s when it will happen and how it will be done.”

While Labor had envisaged 93 per cent of Australian premises being connected via FTTP under the NBN rollout, the current version has 20 per cent of premises connected via FTTP, with 38 per cent connected via FTTN or fibre-to-the-basement, and 34 per cent via hybrid-fibre coaxial.

There has been speculation since Malcolm Turnbull took over as prime minister that the Coalition would consider a greater FTTP rollout.

Following the change of leadership, Ovum government technology principal analyst Al Blake noted that with Turnbull as prime minister it “may allow for an NBN recalibration”.

“Declaring an SBAS will go some way to simplifying and clarifying the regulations that apply in this area, and give access seekers certainty about gaining wholesale access to services on these networks,” ACCC chairman Rod Sims stated.

The ACCC has proposed that telecommunications providers be allowed access to services with a downstream data rate normally more than 25 Mbps on all fixed line networks.

However, under the proposed declaration, where the network operator is already facing competition from alternative fixed network providers, access will not be required.

“The ACCC considers declaration of an SBAS will promote the long-term interests of end-users because it is likely to promote competition between telecommunications providers supplying services to end-users,”  Sims added.

The declaration will not apply to services supplied by NBN Co or on HFC networks that will be transferred to NBN Co, and services regulated under the ACCC’s Local Bitstream Access Service declaration.

It would apply to services including Telstra’s FTTP (fibre-to-the-premises) networks in South Brisbane and Velocity estates, iiNet’s VDSL network in the ACT and HFC networks in regional Victoria, TPG’s FTTB (fibre-to-the-basement) networks and Spirit Telecom’s FTTB networks.

The Sky Muster satellite launched into space last October, with NBN stating that the satellite along with 10 NBN ground stations “have undergone extensive testing and monitoring, including end-user trials”.

Around 200 homes in regional and remote areas have trialled the service, with the trials on average delivering speeds of up to 25/5 Mbps for end-users.

“The NBN Sky Muster satellite service will make a truly transformational difference to rural and remote Australians as we offer some of the world’s fastest and largest consumer satellite broadband plans to remote and isolated areas of Australia,” NBN chief customer officer John Simon commented.

Simon stated that NBN has “teamed up with our delivery partners and now have a field force of over 600 trained technicians ready to connect homes around the country”.

“It will take some time to get all eligible premises connected due to the sheer size of our 7.69 million km2 country, so we ask for patience as our teams travel around to install the service,” he commented.

NBN has also cited a new report from global analyst firm Ovum, commissioned by NBN, examining 18 retail service providers internationally offering satellite broadband services.