Australia’s government has expanded its planned National Broadband Network (NBN), promising to service an additional 300,000 households with the 100 Mbps fiber network.
The enlarged rollout covers 93% of the population, up from 90% previously, with the remaining 7% of households in remote areas due to be serviced with wireless or satellite offering speeds of up to 12 Mbps.
The announcement comes at the height of a national election campaign, with the current Labor government due to face voters in a poll on August 21.
However, the conservative opposition party has threatened to cancel the rollout should it win government.
A recent report by Akamai on global internet speeds placed Australia at 50th, stating the country offered average download speeds of 2.6 Mbps.
Consultancies KPMG and McKinsey, which conducted an A$25 million ($22.8m) study on behalf of the government, released in May, had recommended the extended fiber rollout.