MELBOURNE, Australia-Commercial interest is growing in wireless Internet in Australia with news of a $A25 million (US$14 million) national rollout of an i-BURST mobile wireless broadband network beginning in Sydney. In charge of the rollout is CKW Wireless, a wholly owned subsidiary of U.S.-based ArrayComm, which formed a consortium with Vodafone Australia, OzEmail, Total Communications Infrastructure (TCI) and Crown Castle Australia.
Importantly, the i-BURST network reportedly complements current and third-generation (3G) systems and short-range wireless local area 802.11 (WiFi) networks, which allow consumers access across several mobile technologies.
The announcement comes amid an inquiry into the current and potential use of wireless technologies, including wireless local area network (LAN), 3G, Bluetooth, local multipoint distribution system (LMDS) and wireless local loop (WLL) systems, by the Federal House of Representatives.
In related news, Melbourne company Air Portal recently launched public wireless access points in hotels in Melbourne and Sydney.
