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Australia’s state-owned broadband provider plans live trials with 200 end users.
Australia’s NBN on Wednesday held the first public demonstration of its upcoming satellite broadband service, reaching a peak downlink speed of 25 Mbps.
The satellite, called Sky Muster, was launched in October 2015. It is the first of two such satellites tasked with providing broadband coverage to rural and remote areas.
At an event at the Enex test lab in Melbourne, Sky Muster delivered content from the likes of YouTube, Facebook, and Google Maps, among others. A Skype video call was also conducted over the network.
Speeds of 25 Mbps on the downlink and 4 Mbps on the uplink were recorded – the uplink speed was just short of the 5-Mbps maximum that will be available to retail ISPs.
"We are delighted with the progress that we are making towards the planned launch of Sky Muster commercial services in the next couple of months," said Gavin Williams, executive general manager of fixed wireless and satellite at NBN, in a statement.
When it goes live, Sky Muster will provide coverage to 400,000 people, with 220,000-240,000 end users expected to sign up for the service. Sky Muster is expected to officially begin offering services in April.
In the meantime, NBN plans to conduct live trials with 200 premises in the state of Victoria over the coming weeks, in order to conduct further testing ahead of the commercial launch.
