Improved connectivity could deliver $5 billion in economic benefits to a string of regional centres between Sydney and Melbourne, experts have predicted as Telstra switches on a 2,205 km fibre-optic backbone that moves AI and other data between the cities up to 35 times faster than before.

The new backhaul, which Telstra has dubbed the Aura Network, has delivered speeds of up to 83.6 terabits per second (Tbps) in testing and will eventually extend its high-speed connectivity 14,000km across the country, with the new coastal spur linking over 80 data centres alone.

The $1.6 billion network includes two key elements: an ‘Express Path’ with 72 fibre pairs that minimises equipment by connecting only capital cities, and a ‘Foundation Path’ with another 72 fibre pairs that includes ‘on ramps’ and ‘off ramps to link regional towns approximately every 5km.

Aura – which was announced in 2022 as the Intercity Fibre Network and saw its first Sydney-to-Canberra link switched on in May – “is about unlocking opportunity”, Steven Worrall, CEO of Telstra’s backbone subsidiary InfraCo said as the new coastal link was activated.

With global network traffic set to grow up to ninefold by 2033, Worrall said Aura – which will cut latency by 4 per cent and downtime by 50 per cent – “is designed to address these demands with record-breaking speed, scale, and reliability…. The possibilities [Aura] unlocks are truly inspiring.”

Aura will let Telstra supply businesses with ‘dark fibre’ connections at up to 83.6Tbps; scalable ‘direct spectrum’ at 3.8Tbps to 15.2Tbps; or fully managed point-to-point 100Gbps and 400Gbps services to directly connect customer sites and data centres – including exploding AI data centres.

Microsoft is a foundation partner of the Aura network, which will dramatically speed movement of data between data centres supporting Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform and Copilot AI services – including Telstra’s own investment in 21,000 Copilot for Microsoft 365 licenses.

Microsoft has 34.3 per cent of Australia’s infrastructure as a service (IaaS) market, Gartner says, making it the largest local cloud and AI data centre operator ahead of Amazon Web Services (27.7 per cent) – whose recent major outage exposed an Internet soft spot – and Google (19.8 per cent).

Regional aspect

While Aura’s raw speed will support the explosive growth of predominantly AI focused data centre,s with Amazon alone set to invest $20 billion locally through 2029, Worrall particularly called out its value to the more than 2,000 regional communities it will pass through and connect to.

The opportunities of better connectivity for those communities – which include Wollongong, Yerriyong, Queanbeyan, Cooma, and Bombala in NSW; Monash and Deakin, ACT; and Noorinbee North, Orbost, Bairnsdale, Toongabbie, and Warragul in Victoria – “really excites me”, he said.

By providing “on and off ramps” into those regional communities, he said, Aura’s improved connectivity “will help to transform lives and Aussie communities” by supporting virtual healthcare, online education, or technology-assisted agriculture.

The speed of the new fibre-optic is 35 times faster than before. Photo: Shutterstock

Bringing city-grade connectivity to these regional areas makes Aura “a massive change for data transmission across our nation,” Minister for Communications Anika Wells said in launching the coastal link – just the latest element of a network that also includes an 800Tbps undersea upgrade.

“It is critical that a country as vast as Australia prioritises connectivity,” she said, noting that the “free-flowing digital highways of the future” that projects like Aura deliver “are necessary to respond to technological changes” such as AI and quantum computing.

Telstra recently announced the “significant” success of a joint initiative with Silicon Quantum Computing (SQC), spending 12 months testing SQC’s WaterMelon quantum machine learning engine to forecast network performance – and found it could trim weeks of AI training to just days.

A path to economic value

As faster connectivity makes such opportunities more feasible than ever – and in more parts of Australia – an Oxford Economics report has predicted the “step change” Aura network will support 84,000 jobs and deliver $29 billion in additional GDP, including the $5 billion regional boost.

This includes 8,900 jobs during construction, 190 long-term jobs related to operation of the network, and a $2 billion GDP contribution from building the network – which will ultimately connect all capital cities and intermediate regional centres with redundant dual fibres.

The digital economy’s success is “about the ability to transport petabytes of data between data centres, clouds and edge locations within Australia and across the globe,” the report said, noting that the Melbourne-Canberra-Sydney cable passes over 90 per cent of Australia’s data centres.

That means the Aura network “can serve as Australia’s new national fibre backbone” and its 35x capacity boost will, the report said, “be critical to future-proofing Australia’s digital infrastructure to handle the explosive growth of data from cloud computing, AI, IoT, and edge applications.”

If built, additional ‘potential routes’ – including Perth to Darwin, Darwin to Brisbane, and a second route from Brisbane to Sydney – could boost job gains to 100,000 and add an additional $7 billion in GDP overall, including $1.5 billion regionally, by linking mining, defence and other regional users.

“As the digital economy accelerates and becomes increasingly global,” Oxford Economics found, “minimising latency has become a critical priority…. By building this digital backbone, Australia can secure a generational opportunity to lead in the AI and digital economy.”