Telstra Corporation chief executive David Thodey says it is not appropriate to answer questions about the national broadband network (NBN) amid reports the telco and government are close to a deal.
Telstra Corporation chief executive David Thodey says it is not appropriate to answer questions about the national broadband network (NBN) amid reports the telco and government are close to a deal.
Speaking at a media briefing on Telstra's new investment in cloud computing on Thursday, Mr Thodey told reporters he would not respond to questions about the NBN.
"If you ask me a question an NBN I've just got to say no comment," Mr Thodey said.
"You could ask me but you won't get an answer today, it's just not appropriate."
The Australian Financial Review newspaper reported on Thursday the respective boards of Telstra and NBN Co would meet to review the proposed agreement on Friday, ahead of a federal cabinet meeting on Monday.
On June 20, 2010, Telstra and the government-funded company charged with building and operating the network, NBN Co, signed a non-binding heads of agreement.
The key points of the proposed deal included a $9 billion payment to Telstra for NBN Co to lease existing infrastructure, with a further $2 billion payment for costs associated with regulatory reform of the sector.
Negotiations have continued over the past year.
Meanwhile, Telstra announced it would spend $800 million over the next five years to expand its cloud computing business to support growing demand.
Mr Thodey said this was incremental spending on top of what the company was spending on normal capital expenditure.
Part of it would be used to build a new 2,000 square metre data centre in Melbourne that was expected to be commissioned in 2013 and increase Telstra's data capacity by 40 per cent, the company said.
Cloud computing allows companies to lease computing resources such as memory capacity and processing power from external providers.
The theory is that it saves companies from establishing their own physical infrastructure, such as servers.
Instead, employees access all their data, and potentially run applications, via a secure internet link.
Mr Thodey said he hoped Telstra's new revenue streams would represent between 25 to 30 per cent of total revenue over the next three to five years.
At 1210 AEST, Telstra shares were down 1.5 cents at $3.035.
