What is the Regional Backbone Blackspots Program?
The Regional Backbone Blackspots Program (RBBP) was an Australian Government initiative with the specific objective of providing competitive wholesale backbone services to underserved regional markets. Vocus (as its Nextgen Networks business) won the role to design, construct, manage, operate, and maintain these new backbone transmission links on behalf of the Australian Government.
Regional Backbone Blackspots Program
Program description
As part of its National Broadband Network (NBN) commitment, the Australian Government allocated up to $250 million in funding to improve backbone transmission market outcomes in several priority ‘blackspot’ locations.In July 2009, the Commonwealth issued a Request for Tender (RFT) to build, operate, and maintain backbone transmission links under the Regional Backbone Blackspots Program (RBBP) to six key locations:
- Geraldton, Western Australia
- Darwin, Northern Territory
- Emerald and Longreach, Queensland
- Broken Hill, New South Wales
- Victor Harbor, South Australia
- South West Gippsland, Victoria
Following a competitive tender process, Vocus (as Nextgen Networks) was selected to build, operate, and maintain nearly 6,000km of new fibre infrastructure. Vocus also made a substantial financial contribution to the RBBP and delivered the following core capabilities:
- Over 100 service-ready points of interconnect benefiting nearly 400,000 regional homes and businesses
- Provision for future access points roughly every 10km along each route
- Use of Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) optical fibre technology with an initial trunk capacity of 10Gbps, scalable to meet future demand
The RBBP network also supports a wide range of wholesale services:
- Managed optical fibre and wavelength services (STM16, STM64, Ethernet 1G/10G)
- Carrier-managed leased line and Ethernet services
- Interconnection and colocation
- Data centre and wholesale internet access
- Connectivity to the nearest capital city or Sydney
- Physical or active system-based network protection
Vocus provides RBBP services on an open and equivalent basis, in line with contractual obligations to the Australian Government. This ensures all wholesale customers - including carriers, ISPs, systems integrators, broadcasters, and utilities - have equal access to the infrastructure.
Construction began in February 2010 and was completed within 18 months, with shorter routes delivered ahead of schedule. The network was designed and built in partnership with Visionstream.
This transformative initiative was made possible through the Australian Government’s support under the National Broadband Network Regional Backbone Blackspots Program.
Service locations are set out in accordance with the high-level map as below. Products include transmission, IP, and colocation services suitable for wholesale backhaul purposes.
Our network
The RBBP Network
This initiative was made possible with the support of the Australian Government’s National Broadband Network Regional Backbone Blackspots Program.
