Catalysing regional business development through high speed broadband: Opportunities and risks

Abstract

This chapter explores the effect of the National Broadband Network (NBN) rollout on regional businesses. Research conducted in Tasmania by Inovact Consulting on how regional businesses are responding to broadband access provides illustrations of these opportunities and challenges being played out in the context of an increasingly interconnected global economy. The first part of the chapter examines the opportunities and challenges that the rollout of the NBN presents to regional businesses. The research shows that broadband technology can increase internal efficiencies and harness business growth, grant geographically isolated businesses access to global supply chains and enable innovations that make entering the export market more viable. The second part of this chapter outlines the need for businesses to initially regard the access to high speed broadband as a shock to their operating environment, and to prepare a strategy that views its advent as having potentially disruptive effects. However, once a strategy is in place to preserve and stabilise the company, it can then adopt a forward-thinking strategy for optimal leveraging of opportunities in the digital economy.