The relatively low capacity of current fibre optic mainland connections and their control by a duopoly that is pushing up data transfer prices has acted as a "handbrake" on parts of Tasmania's IT sector, according to Timothy Rosenfield, chief executive officer of Firmus, a Launceston cloud computing company.
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Mr Rosenfield, whose company runs an electricity-intensive data centre in St Leonards, said the cost to send data across Bass Strait is approximately 20 times higher than the cost of sending the same data an equivalent distance on the mainland.
"It has been a major inhibitor at this point in time to the Tasmanian ICT industry. We at Firmus have had to invest much more in our ICT infrastructure because of the higher cost of data at the moment," he said.
But this week's announcement of the funding of the Marinus Link project would be a game changer, he said, because the new optic fibre cable that would be laid as part of the project would help reduce data prices, provide additional backup in case links fail, and cut down the duopoly of Telstra and Basslink - the owners of the only three existing fibre connections across Bass Strait.
"There's currently a duopoly with limited capacity, and there has not been a strong incentive for competitive price and competitive services," he said.
"[Marinus] is an opportunity for Tasmania to break that duopoly and have democratized access to data, and that would be very welcome."
Damian Ivereigh, owner and chief technology officer at Launceston telecoms firm Launtel, said Marinus would be helpful to provide further backups in cases where any of the existing three fibre cables failed, as two of them did at the start of the year.
"Telstra has two links, and the Telstra-one cable is reaching the end of its life - it often goes down for weeks at a time. Purely from a reliability point of view, it would be good for Tasmania to have another link," said Mr Invereigh.
He also agreed that new fibre connections would disrupt the current duopoly, but said it would more likely establish a "price ceiling", rather than dramatically reduce data prices.
Another Tasmanian IT company that has experienced difficulties with the state's data capacity was Secret Lab, a Hobart-based game developer.
Co-founder Dr Paris Buttfield-Addison said in the past he has been forced to mail hard drives of data via courier, rather than sending the data via internet, due to the slow pace of Tasmanian connections.
But that has improved in recent years with the entry of new NBN-based internet providers, he said.
His biggest concern was ensuring there is enough redundancy in Tasmania's fibre connections with Victoria to ensure there is no repeat of the failure of both of Telstra's fibre cables earlier this year, which cut off the state's internet for half a day.
"The software and systems that we use to manage and control the work we are doing ... are hosted on data centres on the mainland and overseas. So on that day the core of our business ground to a complete halt because we couldn't do our normal back-and-forth with people, we couldn't send assets," he said.
Steve Adermann, chief executive officer of TasICT, an industry body representing the state's IT sector, said one of the key benefits of Marinus was the proposed massive increase to the state's data connections.
He said data usage is expected to increase exponentially, and that trends already in place would only fuel more demand for internet connections, including cloud computing, the work from home trend, the internet of things, as well as other developments.
Michael Bailey, chief executive officer of the Tasmanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said: "We live in a digital age and we need to continually look for ways to make sure we can stay at the cutting edge. Not only will Marinus Link enable us to unleash our potential when it comes to renewable energy, it will also underpin Tasmania's place in the rapidly changing and growing online economy."
Madeleine Ogilvie, Minister for Science and Technology, said the new optical fibres to be laid as part of Marinus would boost the state's digital connection capacity by 150 times the present capacity of the existing three lines.
"We understand the need to put downward pressure on the costs of data services, to help Tasmanians connect and do all we can to close the digital divide," she said.
"We will help to ensure the Marinus Link telecommunications cable opportunities are commercialised and integrated into our overarching, long-range strategy to ensure Tasmania is at the forefront of connectivity for the nation."
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