NBN bids will soon be assessed by the expert panel

The first signs that the tender process has really begun will start this weekend when all bidders get the opportunity to put their proposals forward to the governments eight person strong expert panel as they attempt to secure their bids for the $10 billion plus national broadband network.

The first presentations will be given in Canberra by the six bidders on 14 – 15th December, and the Panel will be chaired by Patricia Scott the Communications department secretary.

When the tender process for the building of the NBN, which has been subsidized by $4.7 billion of taxpayer’s money, closed on the 26th of November the government gave the panel eight weeks to decide who should be given the job of building the network.
Both Melbourne based acacia and Singtel Optus have lodged detailed bids for the national broadband network and Telstra have offered an eight page document that essentially offers a detailed bid as long as the government commits to a long list of it demands, which amongst other things means that the government will need to agree to not splitting the telco up.

Part of the proposal submitted by Telstra states that the $4.7 billion on offer will need to be considered as a loan and only 80 percent of Australia will be covered by its network with the funds currently on offer.

An aggressive campaign was recently launched by Telstra to win the tender in which it demonstrated it own technical abilities and ripped into its rival bidders’ financial standing, even though it has yet to lodge a bid that complies with the rules of the tender process.

The details of a lodged bid will be released later in the week by the Canadian group Axia, which is a member of a consortium along with SingTel who are to build a fibre network in Singapore. Bids have also been lodged for their regions by both Canberra utility group TransAct and the Tasmanian Government. At part of the assessment process the expert panel will be given an analytical report on each of the bidders by the Australian Competitions and Consumer Commission on order to help them make their decision.