Australian Telecommunications Industry Research Articles

John Nils Almgren (1930–2021)

John Nils Almgren AM (20 June 1930 to 24 December 2021) was renowned in the Australian telecommunications industry for his success, together with his wife Yvonne, in building a major Australian manufacturing company, J. N. Almgren Pty Ltd, starting from scratch in 1960. JNA began as a custom-designer of small electromechanical subsystems for the PMG and State electricity utilities, but later developed successful electronic products for public and private data networks for large corporations. The company was floated on the ASX in 1992 as JNA Telecommunications Ltd. It operated internationally until bought by the US company Lucent Technologies in 1998. John and Yvonne became significant philanthropists, often declining any publicity for their generous donations.

Policy Legacies from Early Australian Telecommunications

The purpose of this article on the policy legacies from Australia’s early telecommunications history is not to present a counterfactual to Australia’s choice of public monopoly provision of early telecommunications services, but rather to indicate the extent that politics limited the private sector’s role in deploying early telegraph and telephone infrastructure in Australia. The article begins by outlining a theoretical framework for analysing government’s role in deploying new telecommunications technologies, before investigating some of the less familiar literature on the historical impact of government intervention on the private sector in the early Australian telegraph and telephone industries. It then discusses some of the political issues relating to the subsequent liberalisation of the telecommunications industry in Australia and concludes with a discussion of the historical legacies of government intervention on the private sector in the Australian telecommunications industry.

Internationalisation modes in the Australian telecommunications industry: the influence of different innovation types

This paper identifies the influence of product, service and process innovation, radical innovation, competitive intensity and international customer requirements on the firms' preferred internationalisation mode. The empirical research was conducted by means of the questionnaire survey on the Australian telecommunications industry between April and September 2014. The multinomial logistic regression analysed 88 responses with respect to 'no', 'non-equity' and 'equity' internationalisation modes. The results suggest that: 1) internationalisation modes vary according to firm age, RD 2) product innovation and competitive intensity significantly influence firms' preference for 'equity' compared to 'non-equity' internationalisation; 3) neither service nor process innovations are significant predictors of 'equity' compared to 'non-equity' internationalisation; 4) radical innovations significantly predict firms' preference for 'no' compared to 'non-equity' internationalisation. Pertaining to the transaction cost theory, the analysis showed that product innovations are the most important predictor of firms' preference for 'equity' over 'non-equity' internationalisation, and radical innovations bound firms' operations to a domestic market.

Telecommunications Performance Monitoring and Unlimited Data

The Australian telecommunications industry has been slow to call for or to adopt new practices and the National Broadband Network has exacerbated the problem of technology adoption lag. There are two key issues facing telecommunication consumers today. The cost of optical networking has significantly reduced over the past five years so there is no justification for the network congestion that occurs on Australian telecommunication networks. To remedy this situation the introduction of performance monitoring is fully supported. It is time for the telecommunications industry to adopt new broadband business models that are based on the provision of unlimited data and a maximum of 90 to 95 per cent utilisation on optical network links.

Telecommunications Performance Monitoring and Unlimited Data

The Australian telecommunications industry has been slow to call for or to adopt new practices and the National Broadband Network has exacerbated the problem of technology adoption lag. There are two key issues facing telecommunication consumers today. The cost of optical networking has significantly reduced over the past five years so there is no justification for the network congestion that occurs on Australian telecommunication networks. To remedy this situation the introduction of performance monitoring is fully supported. It is time for the telecommunications industry to adopt new broadband business models that are based on the provision of unlimited data and a maximum of 90 to 95 per cent utilisation on optical network links.

Telecommunications Market Evolution

It would be wrong to expect stability in any large and complex industry today. The Australian telecommunications industry is no exception and in the lead-up to 2017 there have been a number of government reviews and inquiries announced that are certain to add to the instability if the outcomes do not focus on the long-term interests of end users. Whilst stability may not be achievable in an industry that is dependent on rapidly changing technology, there are aspects of telecommunications competition policy that are broken and need to be fixed urgently. Now is not the time to take an axe to the telecommunications competition legislation, especially when the underlying causes of the instability are not being tackled. Mr Graham Shepherd, a leading member of the Telecommunications Association Board and the Journal Board for many years, has retired from the Telecommunications Association Board.

Telecommunications Market Evolution

It would be wrong to expect stability in any large and complex industry today. The Australian telecommunications industry is no exception and in the lead-up to 2017 there have been a number of government reviews and inquiries announced that are certain to add to the instability if the outcomes do not focus on the long-term interests of end users. Whilst stability may not be achievable in an industry that is dependent on rapidly changing technology, there are aspects of telecommunications competition policy that are broken and need to be fixed urgently. Now is not the time to take an axe to the telecommunications competition legislation, especially when the underlying causes of the instability are not being tackled. Mr Graham Shepherd, a leading member of the Telecommunications Association Board and the Journal Board for many years, has retired from the Telecommunications Association Board.

The Trollope of Australian Telecommunications

Trevor Barr’s page-turner of a novel Grand Intentions tackles the ugly side of the neo-liberalism sweeping Australia in the 1990s and 2000s. It examines the privatisation of an incumbent telecommunications carrier, and the drastic impact of its imported US corporate culture on several individuals. He deploys a cast of plausible fictional characters while allowing the narrative to be driven by an echo of real events in the Australian telecommunications industry.

The Trollope of Australian Telecommunications

Trevor Barr’s page-turner of a novel Grand Intentions tackles the ugly side of the neo-liberalism sweeping Australia in the 1990s and 2000s. It examines the privatisation of an incumbent telecommunications carrier, and the drastic impact of its imported US corporate culture on several individuals. He deploys a cast of plausible fictional characters while allowing the narrative to be driven by an echo of real events in the Australian telecommunications industry.

The Corporatisation and Privatisation of the Australian Telecommunications Industry: The Role of the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman

The Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman Scheme (TI0 Scheme) is a world first. The creation of an industry based Ombudsman to resolve consumer complaints in telecommunications is a unique Australian innovation. This article examines the origins, structure, functions, role, powers and obligations of the TI0 Scheme. It concludes that while the TI0 Scheme is a competent organisation which performs a crucial role in the new telecommunications regulatory regime introduced on 1 July 1997, there are a number of systemic criticisms which can be made of the new Ombudsman. In short, the "jury is still out on the TIO."

160 years of Australian telecommunications

The Australian telecommunications industry has reached its 160th anniversary this year measured from the completion of its first electrical telegraph network on 3 March 1854, linking Melbourne to Williamstown. The back story to the implementation of that first network suggests that Lieutenant Governor Charles La Trobe and the colony?s first General-Superintendent of Telegraphy, Samuel McGowan, should be celebrated as the founders of Australian telecommunications: the visionary and his appointee, the entrepreneurial project manager. A brief overview is given of how the Australian telecommunications industry has evolved to the present day, including the evolution of the Telecommunications Society of Australia (now TelSoc), a society of volunteers supporting the industry since 1874, i.e. for 140 years of the industry?s 160 years.

Telecommunications for people with disability: This year’s Christopher Newell Prize-winning papers

This editorial provides a brief history of initiatives taken within the Australian telecommunications industry since 1980 to assist people with major disabilities to remain 'connected' via modern telecommunications. It provides background to the annual Telstra-TJA Christopher Newell Prize competition, running since 2010, and concludes by announcing the winners of the 2013 Telstra-TJA Christopher Newell Prize competition.

Regulating Mobile Services

While the development of mobile services is experiencing a spectacular growth in many countries worldwide, existing regulatory regimes are ill equipped for dealing with them. In this paper, the authors use qualitative evidence to investigate the manner in which institutional regulatory factors, including legal, societal, and economic factors, can impact mobile services in the Australian mobile telecommunications industry. These factors are important as they shape both the nature of emerging mobile services and their diffusion trajectory. The investigation culminates with an innovative institutional regulatory framework that includes factors such as consumer and intellectual property protection, market and resources access. The authors argue that co-regulation, a mixture of direct monitoring and intervention of regulators through legislation and complete industry self-regulation, is an effective approach for regulating the mobile telecommunications industry. Given the complex and dynamic nature of this industry, co-regulation can minimize monitoring costs and enhance compliance.

Celebrating 75 years of the Telecommunications Journal of Australia: reflecting 75 years of innovation and change in the Australian telecommunications industry

No description provided Copyright 2010 Peter Gerrand. No part of this article may be reproduced by any means without the written consent of the publisher.

Recruitment Strategies and Union Exclusion in Two Australian Call Centres

Recruitment processes are seen as critical to the success of contemporary organizations and integral to human resource practices, particularly in those firms setting up greenfield operations or undertaking organizational change programs. This article analyses the recruitment methods used in several large call centres in the Australian telecommunications industry. It particularly focuses on the issue of how recruitment was explicitly or implicitly designed to recruit customer service representatives who might be antithetic to workplace trade unionism. Three processes are identified. These include the use of sophisticated recruitment processes which identify those with unitarist tendencies, identifying and excluding, or blacklisting, those with union backgrounds or those who previously worked in highly unionized firms and lastly applying pressure on recruits to sign individual non-union contracts at the appointment or promotion stage.

Bundling in the Australian Telecommunications Industry

This article considers some of the implications for social welfare of bundling in the Australian telecommunications industry. The practice of bundling—offering two or more products for sale as a single package—is a strategy used in many industries. Although common, there are circumstances when the practice can be used anti‐competitively. Yet bundling does not always harm consumers; at times, the practice benefits both consumers and producers, and it can even advantage consumers to the detriment of producers. The general literature on bundling suggests that its effect on social welfare depends on several factors such as market structure, the elasticity of demand for the products, the marginal cost of production, economies of distribution and the use of complex menus. We consider these factors when assessing the likely welfare effects of bundling in the Australian telecommunications industry, concluding that the potential effects of bundling on competition and the information costs imposed on consumers by complex menus of services seem the most significant considerations for social welfare. It is desirable that regulatory authorities monitor developments closely, although heavy‐handed regulation of bundling seems undesirable.

The rise of the Australian Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman

Australia is the first jurisdiction in the world to introduce a national private telecommunications industry ombudsman. Created in 1993, the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman (TIO) has grown in jurisdiction and importance, becoming a regulatory cornerstone of the fully competitive post-1997 Australian telecommunications regime. This paper examines the role of the TIO as a mechanism for dispute resolution and as an industry regulator, suggesting that it provides an example of an innovatory regulatory process which transcends the divide between deregulation and proregulation. This raises the question as to the applicability of the ombudsman institution in terms of the regulation of telecommunications. Through highlighting the conciliatory nature of the ombudsman, the role of the TIO as a regulator is considered in its Australian context.

Working cooperatively in an age of deregulation

This paper outlines the first part of a longitudinal study exploring strategic alliances as central mechanisms of inter‐firm cooperation in the Australian telecommunications sector. It reports on the collaboration practices of the three carriers – Telecom, Optus and Vodafone – and their first‐tier “partners”. The Australian telecommunications industry is a useful site for theory testing and development because of its degree of business concentration, the strategic relationships and networks involved and the role of government in encouraging alliances and networks, especially since the move away from a single government‐owned monopoly‐carrier environment. The recent proliferation of interorganisational alliances means we need new approaches to understanding and a move away from simple assumptions about complex organizational structures and processes. Neither is the current superficial rhetoric promoting such arrangements as the answer to industry ills adequate. Conseqently, the present study aims to enhance more complex understanding of how such structural arrangements actually work – how they are formed, organized and managed over time. The study methodology centres on analysis of research and in‐depth interviews with key industry and government executives. Proposed extensions of the present work involve a detailed communications industry survey and network analysis of relationships, with a special focus on relationships growing in the convergence of the telecommunications, entertainment, computing and media industries. When quotations from study participants are used, sources are generally not acknowledged in an endeavour to keep as much anonymity as possible.

Monitoring telecommunications deregulation through international benchmarking

Abstract As telecommunications markets in an increasing number of countries are deregulated to allow competition, there is increasing interest in information about whether the promised benefits of competition are in fact materialising. This paper suggests a framework for monitoring the effects of deregulation in a particular country through the use of international ‘best practice’ benchmarking. Such international benchmarking seems particularly appropriate in these times of increasing telecommunications globalisation. The Australian telecommunications industry is used as a case study to illustrate the application of the monitoring procedure. Rather than applying seemingly esoteric economic criteria, the effects of deregulation are appraised under the headings of several frequently asked questions about the telecommunications industry.

The differential use of written, computer-based and verbal information in an organizational context An empirical exploration

The ways in which individual characteristics and task attributes affect the use of different types of information is a pertinent issue in Organisational Analysis and in the development of Information Systems. This article reports on a study which examined and compared patterns of use of written, computer-based, and verbal information by 1300 full-time employees from the Australian Telecommunications industry. The participants in this study made much more frequent use of verbal information than either written or computer derived information. Computer-derived information was the least prominent mode of communication. Patterns of information usage were found to be relatively independent of demographic characteristics such as age, tenure, job category and job rank. Nevertheless multiple regressions analysis revealed that the use of each type of information was affected by a variety of individual and organisational factors. The overall findings lend support to the suggestion that verbal information is used not as an alternative to, but in conjunction with, other forms of communication.