Chorus is rolling out a new very fast broadband service to the mass market on its copper network in an effort to spark more interest in ultra fast broadband on the fibre network.
The company is launching VDSL at a similar price to the current regular broadband service but with much faster speeds. It is currently sold as a niche product at a higher price.
Chorus will offer VDSL from 7 June to retail service providers, which will then market their own plans and pricing to households and businesses.
Telecommunications Users Association chief executive Paul Brislen said the industry has been pushing for VDSL for some time.
He said VDSL is a half-way measure that will encourage the uptake of faster broadband services and internet providers to roll out new products that require faster speeds.
"So we've been pushing for awhile now to help educate the market about broadband as it should be and why you'll need fibre once it becomes available in the next few years."
Mr Brislen said most people will be on copper for the next four or five years at least, so it's quite important that there is faster copper services in the meantime to both provide faster speeds and educate the market about what can be done with it.
Mr Brislen said the uptake of ultrafast broadband is currently only about 3% and that's because there's nothing in the market today that you need fibre for.
For home users most of the demand will come from high definition television and video content which is currently not available on any scale in New Zealand.
Telecom says it will offer the product to customers soon after the launch in June.
Retail chief executive Chris Quin said VDSL users will pay a small premium to upload and download data that could be several times faster than normal broadband but they may have to pay more for extra data.
He said it's based on the current copper, but goes four to five times faster than the ordinary broadband.
No profit
Chorus says the service is not a money-making venture.
Corporate affairs manager Ian Bonnar said the main aim is to provide a stepping stone toward ultra fast fibre broadband which will not be available in some areas until 2019.
He said the product is now part of the copper-based broadband charges that are currently under review by the Commerce Commission.
In December, the commission proposed cutting the charges, causing Chorus' share price to slump.
