Scoop has an Ethical Paywall
Download Weekly—Winter, game updates see UFB traffic surge
Data in demand as temperatures drop
June 8 saw a new record for daily data use on the Chorus network. The fibre wholesale company says it moved 30 petabytes of data as gamers downloaded the latest Fortnite update.
Per-connection downloads averaged 671 GB in June. That’s a four percent increase compared with 642 GB in April.
At the top end of the curve, close to 19 percent of customers downloaded a terabyte of data. This coincided with the arrival of cold, wintry weather and the Big Fibre Boost which saw customers on standard plans move from 300 Mbps to 500 Mbps.
Fortnite has form when it comes to Chorus network data surges.
Fibre uptake
Fibre uptake continued to edge up in the quarter, by 0.1 percent. This brings the total uptake to 72.1 percent across the 1,532,000 addresses passed by Chorus’ network. The growth was faster in areas connected during the second phase of the UFB network build with the total in UFB2 areas climbing from 61 to 62 percent.
Chorus says another 11,000 users signed up for the entry level Home Fibre Starter plan which increased its speeds from 50/10 to 100/20 Mbps in June. This is a product aimed at less well-off homes. Two-thirds of the users signing up for the plan were new connections.
During the quarter, 15,000 copper lines were disconnected. The total has now dropped to 92,000. Chorus expects there will be no copper lines in its fibre areas by the middle of next year.
Starlink promises terabit capacity next year
A Starlink network update says SpaceX aims to launch its third-generation satellites in the first half of 2026. The update says these will “add an order of magnitude improvement in capacity compared to the current satellite”.
Specifically, the new satellites will deliver a terabyte per second of downlink capacity and 200 Gbps of uplink capacity. It says this is ten times the downlink capacity and 24 times the uplink capacity of today’s second generation satellites.
On top of that, Starlink says the third-generation satellites will use next-generation computers, modems, beamforming and switching to improve the network’s latency. The new satellites will connect to each other with optical links for additional backhaul.
Starlink says it is aiming for 20ms latency.
While Starlink promises a lot, there is a catch. SpaceX has optimised its satellites to launch on the company’s Starship rockets. They are the ones that keep exploding.
Busy time for appointments
Spark network simplification leader Steven Lawrence is the new chief technical director for Next Generation Critical Communications.
During his time with Spark, Lawrence worked on the telco’s contribution to the Public Safety Network’s cellular roaming and priority services. He also had responsibility for Spark’s delivery of 111 emergency services.
Crown-owned research network operator Reannz has appointed Jo Perez as head of corporate services and chief financial officer. Perez has previously worked for New Zealand Rugby, Department of Corrections and Trade Me.
Former Trustpower and Mercury chief executive Vince Hawksworth is now working as a power and energy strategy advisor for Datagrid.
Phone market flat in Q2, likely to stay that way for 2025
The analysts don’t agree. Canalys says the phone market “marginally declined” in the second quarter of 2025. Counterpoint says the market was up two percent. IDC says it was up one percent. Taken collectively, we can assume there’s not much going on.
All three agree Samsung is the top-selling phone brand. Apple is in second place and Xiaomi in third. While Samsung and Apple grew faster than the overall market, Samsung grew the most.
Canalys thinks the market will remain flat over the whole of 2025. IDC hints at growth without offering anything specific. Counterpoint makes no comment on the subject.
The analysts all note the current uncertainty over tariffs is having an impact on the market. There’s a sense that, if or when. the US stops its on-again, off-again tariff talk, the market is poised for take-off, but don’t expect that to happen this year.
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Tuanz releases Connecting Aotearoa report
Tuanz — Connecting Aotearoa
Chorus has released a report based on the Connecting Aotearoa summit in Hamilton. (Download Weekly reported on the summit in May.)
Like
the conference, the report aims to answer the
question:
Why can’t 100 percent of New Zealanders be
connected?
With one in five households still not connected, there’s a pressing need to bring everyone who wants to be online into the fold.
While there are issues with rural connectivity and digital skills, the cost of connecting remains the most intractable issue.
In other news...
- Auckland firm IQ Hive could enable more MVNOs—Reseller News
- South Island cool climate makes it ideal for data centres—The Press
- New Zealand farmers falling behind on technology transformation—Farmers Weekly
- “Senior industry figures I’ve spoken to are increasingly sceptical about whether this government can deliver on anything that requires actual strategic thinking in the tech space.”—BusinessDesk (paywall).
Analyst skewers Spark’s Agile strategy
Eden Bradfield takes no prisoners in his withering overview of Spark’s performance. The story is behind BusinessDesk’s paywall.
Among the jabs, he connects the company’s embrace of Agile to its sagging share price.
Agile is a software development methodology. It doesn’t necessarily translate well to other businesses disciplines.
In 2018, Spark announced it was adopting Agile companywide. I asked then-CEO Simon Moutter about this.
He said half of Spark’s capital was spent on software. Hence Spark was a software company. Kind of.
It sounded plausible. Spark owned Lightbox, a streaming TV business. There was Spark Sport and Morepork, the home security business, Qrious, a data analytics division and Mattr, focused on identify and verification software.
All could be viewed through a software and digital services lens.
Since then, Lightbox, Spark Sport and Morepork have left the building. To the outside world today’s Spark looks less like a software company. Yet the commitment to Agile remains.
Like others, Bradfield raises the prospect of a private equity buy out.
It’s possible. If that happens, how long do you give Agile?
Download Weekly five years ago
Spark plans to retire PSTN in Devonport and Miramar by Christmas. The move will affect around 1000 customers.
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Winter, game updates see UFB traffic
surge was first posted at
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Bill Bennett
Freelance journalist.
Auckland-based Bill Bennett writes technology and business stories that are directly relevant to New Zealand readers.
His emphasis is on telecommunications, but he also covers other aspects of technology and business. You can find his features in the New Zealand Herald and hear him regularly on RNZ Nine to Noon and the NZ Tech Podcast.
Bennett's The Download Weekly newsletter is published every Friday. You can sign up for it here.
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