Chapter 7 Research and innovation
7.1
This chapter discusses the capacity of the NBN to contribute to the
research and development (R&D) conducted by both public research
institutions and by private industry. It primarily addresses term of reference
(g), focusing on the NBN’s ‘interaction with research and development and
related innovation investments’.
7.2
The Committee heard that while most major research facilities already
have a high level of connectivity through existing fibre networks, the NBN will
enable research to take place in a wider range of locations and improve the
ability of researchers to collaborate with stakeholders.
7.3
The NBN will also provide critical enabling infrastructure for
innovative practices and products to be developed in Australia which impact all
industry sectors. This will generate new opportunities for industry to develop
high-bandwidth applications that could both improve both the productivity and the
quality of life of Australians, and potentially be exported to the world.
ICT investment, innovation, R&D and productivity improvement
7.4
The importance of innovation to Australia’s productivity, global
competitiveness and long term economic growth has been well-recognised. This
was highlighted, for example, in the Federal Government’s 2009 innovation agenda,
Powering Ideas:
Innovation is the key to making Australia more productive and
more competitive. It is the key to answering the challenge of climate change,
the challenge of national security, the age-old challenges of disease and want.
It is the key to creating a future that is better than the past.[1]
7.5
Mr John Grant, Chair of the Information Technology Industry Innovation
Council (ITIIC), told the Committee:
… we are operating in a global context and our success or
otherwise will depend on how competitive we are globally, and how competitive
we are is determined by how productive we are. How productive we are is
determined by how innovative we are …[2]
7.6
Mr Grant added that Australia’s innovation performance and resulting
productivity growth has been weak in recent years.[3]
Australia ranked 21st in the world for innovation on the most recent
‘Global Innovation Index’ produced by INSEAD, well behind many other high
income countries including Singapore, the United States, the United Kingdom and
New Zealand.[4] Mr Grant largely blamed
this on the relatively low level of R&D spending in the Australian economy:
If you believe research and development fuels innovation,
which subsequently fuels productivity, which subsequently fuels
competitiveness, R&D as a percentage of GDP in Australia is 1.7 per cent,
which is 16th of OECD nations. In product innovation in large firms, we are
20th of OECD nations … The fact is that statistically we do not sit strongly
today to position ourselves as a competitive nation.[5]
7.7
The link between Australia’s relatively low level of R&D investment
and the impact on the nation’s competitiveness was noted by a number of other inquiry
participants. For example, the Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA)
submitted that:
Australia spends some 2.01% of GDP on research and
development (R&D) compared to the OECD average of 2.26% … By any measure,
Australia is lagging behind the key developed economies against whom we
benchmark ourselves’.[6]
7.8
Optus put forward a similar view:
The current lack of private ICT investment in R&D has
been well documented. Many large global ICT multinational corporations have
closed down or moved their R&D operations outside Australia. Investment in
public sector R&D has been similarly difficult to secure …
A competitive R&D sector will see accelerated innovation.[7]
7.9
While it is clear that there is not a single factor that will alone turn
around this performance, the Committee was provided with a wide range of
evidence indicating that investments in ICT infrastructure, in particular
broadband, have the ability to significantly contribute to improving innovation
and productivity.
7.10
A recent report to the Australian Industry Group (Ai Group) by the
industry-based Innovation Review Steering Group involved over 400 Australian
firms in a detailed collaborative study aimed at finding ways to strengthen
Australian innovation.[8] According to the report, the
industry participants identified broadband as one of the most important
contributors to the nation’s innovative capacity:
The technologies viewed as most promising by firms for
creating future innovation opportunities are fast broadband and software
applications …
The rollout of a very high speed national broadband network
provides an unprecedented opportunity for Australian businesses to transform
their innovation practice, in terms of realising cost-savings, productivity,
extending market reach and introducing brand new types of products and services
…
… irrespective of the detail of broadband deployment and the
particular technologies used, the prospect of ubiquitous connectivity, across
both businesses and households, represents a real opportunity to achieve a
step-change in Australian innovation.[9]
7.11
Dr Ian Oppermann, Director of the CSIRO ICT Centre, told the Committee:
Almost all sectors of the Australian economy are underpinned
by information and communications technologies. Innovative ICT research
provides opportunities for improving productivity and transforming industries.
It is likely that high-speed broadband will offer a transformation in
communications on a scale similar to that which followed the introduction of
the electricity grid and railway networks in Australia, creating new business
opportunities of considerable economic value.[10]
7.12
The Australian Computer Society (ACS) described the NBN’s ability to
promote innovation as being obvious:
With respect to ICT stakeholders this view is a ‘no brainer’—the
NBN is a ‘game changer’ and in implementing the NBN, Australia will lead the
world in innovation and drastically improve national productivity.[11]
7.13
The ITIIC explained in its submission that:
… underpinning innovation is the development and application
of the appropriate skills; the appropriate legislative, policy and incentive
settings; and the infrastructure of the digital economy—ubiquitous, high
speed, high capacity, broadband communications.[12]
7.14
Similarly, the AIIA’s submission stated that a high-speed fibre network offers
a unique opportunity for a resurgence in R&D and innovation and was
essential to Australia’s future economic growth and competitiveness:
… the NBN infrastructure provides the platform for technology
innovation using high performance computing capabilities—essential for
virtually all modern day, sophisticated research activities. As we transition
to a more advanced, complex knowledge society, access to information is not
enough. Increasingly the ability to filter, manipulate, retrieve, model and
share information in real time is the norm—not the exception. If Australia is
to compete effectively in the international R&D environment, we must have
the capability to handle, filter and make sense of large, complex volumes of
data. Only a high speed fibre broadband network provides this—reliably and with
the ability to scale as research activities become increasingly data and
knowledge intensive.[13]
Attracting foreign ICT investment in Australia
7.15
In its submission to the inquiry, the Department of Broadband,
Communications and the Digital Economy (DBCDE) pointed to the following
characteristics of the NBN that will help to drive research-based innovation in
Australia:
- Capacity for both
high-speed download and upload services, which enable collaborative research
both locally and overseas;
- Ubiquitous coverage,
which both lowers the costs of innovation and increases the size of potential
markets for new products and services; and
- Highly stable and
reliable connectivity, which provides a suitable platform for research and
innovation.[14]
7.16
One result of these network characteristics is expected to be an
improvement in Australia’s global competitiveness as a destination for private
sector investment in ICT research. DBCDE noted that the ‘roll out of the NBN
may attract international and domestic companies to invest in research and
development that promotes and expands Australia’s innovative capacity’.[15]
7.17
Optus made similar comments:
Optus believes with the right incentives Australia has the
potential to attract back many of the large multinational ICT innovation
centres. Important incentives such as the NBN and attractive tax structures
would encourage larger and small businesses to invest in innovation.[16]
7.18
Several submissions mentioned the positive impact that the
government’s commitment to the NBN has already had in encouraging IBM to set up
a Global Research and Development Laboratory in Australia.[17]
The laboratory, based in Melbourne, is the largest investment in Australia in
IBM’s history and is undertaking research aligned with Australia’s national
research priorities. In launching the laboratory, then IBM Managing Director, Mr
Glen Boreham, stated that ‘… delivering these types of real solutions is
without question further enhanced by Australia rolling out a ubiquitous, high
speed broadband network’.[18]
7.19
The local division of the large China-based telecommunications
company, Huawei, told the committee that it has already begun to increase its
ICT investments in Australia, with agreements now in place with RMIT University
and the University of Melbourne for the supply of equipment and training to
support local ICT research and skills development. Huawei stated:
Even though the National Broadband Network is just seeing its
first connections being made today, Australia is already experiencing a boost
to its R&D capabilities. Thanks to the world-leading
nature of the project, it has gained international attention from the world’s
largest technology companies—with Huawei taking the lead in partnering with
Australia’s R&D community.[19]
7.20
Finally, several witnesses and submitters told the Committee that the
NBN will support Australia’s bid to host the $2.5 billion Square Kilometre
Array (SKA) radioastronomy project, both in terms of providing supporting
infrastructure and providing enhanced capacity for public engagement.[20]
Refer to Box 7.1 for information about the SKA.
Box 7.1 The Square Kilometre Array (SKA)
Professor Steven Tingay of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy
Research told the Committee that the €1.5 billion* Square Kilometre Array
(SKA) will be the most powerful instrument for astronomy ever built. It will
have ability to study the evolution of the Universe, from the present day to
the origin of the Universe soon after the Big Bang, over 13 billion years ago,
addressing fundamental unsolved questions in physics.
Australia and New Zealand are bidding as a consortium to host the SKA,
competing with Southern Africa for this opportunity. An international site
selection process will come to a decision in 2012.
One of the infrastructure challenges of the SKA project will be in providing
for the ability to transfer the ‘massive volumes’ of data produced by the SKA
using long haul fibre networks. The SKA will consist of around 3000 radio
antennas spread across remote parts of Australia, with each requiring
‘something in the order of a couple of hundred gigabits per second’ of
bandwidth.
Professor Tingay noted that while the SKA’s capacity requirements ‘go well
beyond’ the capacity that the NBN alone will provide, the Perth to Geraldton
route of the Regional Backbone Blackspots Program (RBBP) has already
demonstrated that the NBN can play ‘a crucial role’ in enabling
collaboratively developed fibre solutions that support the SKA. With
collaboration between CSIRO, AARNet and the Government, the RBBP link to
Geraldton was built with enough capacity to enable up to 8 terabits per
second of accumulated bandwidth.
Professor Tingay noted that the potential for this model to be repeated along
other NBN fibre routes across Australia ‘is quite a strong selling point for
Australian and New Zealand to win the SKA bid’.
Source: ICRAR, Submission 228; Committee Hansard, Perth, 5 May 2011.
* approximately AUD $2.1 billion as at 11 August 2011. |
Research in more locations and improved collaboration
7.21
The NBN will benefit research and innovation by extending the reach of
high capacity networks beyond the large public research institutions, which
already have access to a high bandwidth network through AARNet, Australia’s
National Research and Education Network (NREN). AARNet Pty Ltd is owned by the
38 universities and CSIRO. It provides specialised services to the research and
education sector, with capacities beyond those available from commercial
carriers. A number of universities, schools and other research institutions
told the Committee that they are already enjoying the benefits of high-speed
broadband on their campuses with connections to AARNet of up to 10 Gbit/s, far
beyond the initial speeds promised under the NBN.[21]
7.22
Dr Evan Arthur, Chair of the Australian Information and Communications
Technology in Education Committee (AICTEC), told the Committee that the
universities have benefited greatly from this high level of connectivity, and
researchers were quickly able to utilise the capacity that AARNet provided:
When we first commenced that process and asked the university
researchers what they would do and what kind of bandwidth they would need, the
answers were quite modest. We made a decision to provide bandwidth which was
well beyond what they had said they would need. The result of that has been
that the vastly enhanced connection is now, in some cases, being used to its
maximum and applications are being employed which were simply inconceivable
before.[22]
7.23
AARNet Pty Ltd will shortly be upgrading its network to support
connections of up to 100 Gbit/s.[23] AARNet told the
Committee that its interests are complementary to the NBN, and that the benefit
of the NBN is that it would extend AARNet’s reach to smaller university sites
as well as staff and student homes.[24] At a public hearing, Mr
Chris Hancock, Chief Executive of AARNet, further explained that for those
reasons AARNet intends to become a service provider of the NBN outside its core
network:
We have applied … to be an access seeker and we have been
approved as one of those … The reason we have done that is that we believe
that, with collaborative research opening up across the community and given the
time zones that Australia is in, with Europe and North America, we actually
want to take a connection to the home from, for example, UNE in Armidale to a
climate change researcher’s home, so they can be doing their collaborative work
at night over an AARNet connection via the NBN, taking that wholesale service.[25]
7.24
Other submitters and witnesses also told the Committee about the NBN’s
potential to extend research outside the large campuses. For example, Intersect
Australia Ltd, an eResearch consortium consisting mainly of NSW universities,
submitted that:
The NBN would provide an important and substantial functional
extension to AARNet, allowing connectivity to smaller but important research
sites, facilitating broadband access to non-university research partners, and
allowing research staff and students to access the research infrastructure from
wherever they are. Achieving this level of connectivity would (a) maximise the
return on the existing investments made in research infrastructure, and (b)
maximise the competitive advantage of Australian research on a world scale.[26]
7.25
The Committee notes with interest the view of the Department of
Innovation, Industry, Science and Research (DIISR) and National ICT Australia
(NICTA) with regard to the extension of research beyond the AARNet network.
DIISR told the Committee:
Research is no longer traditionally happening just in labs;
it is happening everywhere. People are in the field, people are in their homes,
people want to access huge data sets from institutions that are not
universities and therefore are not connected to AARNet. So we see the
opportunities of that broader connection for the research sector as being
absolutely enormous. We see already the requirements that people might have for
access to data sets in, for example, state government departments and in field
stations in relatively remote areas. We can see already that this will enhance
the capacity for them to undertake that research significantly.[27]
7.26
NICTA noted that the NBN would provide the following benefits beyond
those provided by AARNet:
- Connecting smaller,
outlying research sites;
- Connecting staff and
students to high speed services from their homes, enabling researchers to be ‘as
productive at home as they are at work’;
- Potentially providing
‘backbone’ capacity in areas not currently served by the AARNet backbone; and
- Proving more options
for connecting K-12 institutions that are not currently connected with fibre.[28]
7.27
NICTA further submitted that:
As digital technology lowers the cost base, innovation can
move to smaller companies or even to private homes as the consumer becomes an
innovation co-inventor. The NBN will bring richer digital tools to consumer and
small business and make it easier to collaborate with others in an innovation
ecosystem and provide a more powerful platform to share the results. This kind
of effect is already being seen in the media industry where graphic designers,
musicians, video-producers and visual effects artists can now run their
micro-SMEs from home.[29]
Research in remote locations
7.28
A number of witnesses and submitters told the Committee about the capacity
of the NBN to enable data-intensive research, particularly environmental
research, to take place in a wider range of locations. Chapter 5 on infrastructure
and the environment includes some discussion of the possibilities for enhanced
environmental monitoring and resource management under the NBN. This section
refers to more explicit implications for research, including the benefits of
satellite broadband in the production of high quality data for analysis. As
noted in Chapter 5, the application of remote sensors in environmental
monitoring is increasing in prevalence, and the importance of connectivity
between researchers working on collaborative projects should not be
underestimated. CSIRO notes that:
… sensor networks have been deployed in remote locations,
with the data traffic generated per sensor varying from a few bytes to
gigabytes. Broadband networks will enable the transfer of data from the sensors
back to laboratories.[30]
7.29
The Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS), a publically funded
research agency that carries out marine science across northern Australia, told
the Committee that it currently depends on expensive mobile and satellite
services to support its remote monitoring stations. AIMS submitted that the improved
capacity and affordability of the NBN, particularly in satellite broadband,
will have a significant impact on their work:
For very remote locations, such as outer reefs, we only have
very limited access to expensive and slow satellite communications and this is
true for much of Northern Australia. Access to high speed cost-effective
internet would dramatically change how we can work in these areas and open up
entirely new studies and science outcomes from these regions.[31]
7.30
The Committee heard that the NBN’s
satellite component provides exciting new possibilities for research and
innovation. Thales Group, the world’s largest producer of commercial
spacecraft, argued that satellite is the most effective technology for remote
scientific monitoring:
Where scientific measurement
or monitoring requires long term data collection using remote equipment
stations, satellite broadband coverage is the most effective solution.
Instruments that measure a broad range of geological and atmospheric conditions
are increasingly vital components in our ability to monitor and understand our
environment. Remote instruments connected to a satellite broadband system can
meet higher demands for data and real time manipulation by remote control.[32]
7.31
Professor Ian Atkinson, Director of the eResearch Centre at James Cook
University (JCU), explained how satellite services provided by the NBN would
enable research in the Daintree Rainforest to be undertaken far more
effectively. Professor Atkinson discussed plans for JCU to introduce a research
station at the university’s ‘canopy crane’ in the rainforest. The crane ‘can go
across the canopy and sample the rainforest at various depths and locations’,
and the university intends to place sensors there that are capable of sending
real-time information back to researchers:
It turns out that those
scientists need very high resolution information. They need information around
the microclimates, not just one square kilometre; they want to know the
microclimate variations up a tree so that they can understand animal habitats
in a very detailed and fine way. They want to be able to do that so that they
can understand how the rainforest will respond to changes in climate, how its
carbon balance changes, how those animal populations change.
To actually get communications
into that area is quite diabolical. For us to get any sort of communications
into the deep rainforest, mobile phone coverage just does not exist at the
moment. With the satellite systems we think that we can really be stepping
forward not just one or two steps, but 10 or 11 steps … It is going to take a
long time and other sorts of development, but it is the ability to communicate
in real-time that unlocks that potential for them.[33]
7.32
The Space Industry Innovation
Council also advised the Committee about the broad potential for scientific
innovation enabled by the satellite component of the NBN:
The NBN satellites will be
state of the art, and could well generate new products, services, processes and
therefore new jobs in Australia as this highly performing communications
capability is brought online.[34]
7.33
Additionally, the Space Industry Association of Australia (SIAA) submitted
that there may be other opportunities beyond just faster broadband made
possible from the launch of NBN satellites, in respect to additional monitoring
equipment being attached to the satellites:
… the SIAA notes the in principle prospects of placing
smaller secondary or ‘hosted’ payloads on the NBN satellites. These payloads
might include devices which assist with precision navigation and sensors which
monitor green house gases and other atmospheric and solar phenomena … the SIAA
commends the NBN Co and Government to consider the opportunity of fitting
hosted payloads to future NBN satellites …[35]
Research collaboration
7.34
Professor Craig Bonnington, Director of the Monash E-Research Centre,
told the Committee that although Monash University enjoys a 10 Gbit/s
connection at its main campus, due to a lack of more ubiquitous connectivity
its researchers are unable to collaborate online as effectively with colleagues
in Australia as they are with international counterparts.[36]
Professor Adam Shoemaker, Deputy Vice-Chancellor of Education at Monash,
elaborated:
It is fair to say that while we are in a ‘privileged island’
position … the communities immediately outside our campus are completely off
the island. That is really the problem.[37]
7.35
The Committee accepts the view expressed in Monash University’s
submission that issues such as ‘climate change modelling, population
distribution and green energy solutions are extremely data centric’ and that access
to a high speed affordable data network is needed for ‘the free flow of
information and research data between universities, research institutes,
business, industry and the community as a whole’.[38]
This concern about the ability to collaborate was echoed by other universities
and research institutions around Australia who recognised the NBN’s potential to enable improved linkages to industry
partners, community groups, remote sites and other research collaborators.[39]For example, the University of Sydney submitted that:
Providing the vast majority of
Australian homes, schools and businesses with an optical fibre connection to a
national network, will mean that high speed broadband connectivity will no
longer be limited to a relatively small number of public and private sector
organisations … As a result, we expect that the capacity for collaboration in
teaching, training and research between employers, schools, vocational
education providers, universities and other organisations will be enhanced
greatly.[40]
7.36
AIMS suggested that issues around
equity of access to communications services will potentially be addressed by
the NBN. AIMS noted that many of its remote and regional stakeholders are
currently ‘excluded from opportunities that affordable high speed
communications enables’.[41] The potential for the NBN to
enable improved research collaboration is particularly significant because a
lack of collaboration is widely recognised as an area of weakness in Australia’s
research performance. The AIIA submitted that:
Australia ranks last in the
OECD on collaboration for innovation between business and higher education
institutions. This is notwithstanding that collaboration is regarded as one of
the single most important contributors to innovation development …[42]
7.37
Similarly, Professor Doan Hoang of
the University of Technology, Sydney, told the Committee:
The recent Excellence in
Research for Australia (ERA) initiative has affirmed that on the whole the
research quality of Australian institutions are above the international
benchmark, however, research collaboration amongst them and with international
partners is insignificant.[43]
7.38
Professor Hoang continued to
explain that the current lack of collaboration is partly due to funding models
and partly due to a lack of facilitating infrastructure. According to Professor
Hoang, the NBN would overcome the latter problem by providing a platform for
high-bandwidth interaction and data transfer between collaborators:
With the NBN, the distance
barrier between institutes/organisations is no longer an issue as the network
performance provides adequate bandwidth for just-in-time collaborative
environments and fast response times for real-time interaction at minimal costs
to the institutions (compared to the current situation). Furthermore, the NBN
provides abundant bandwidth to support the transfer of the massive amount of
data often required …[44]
7.39
In his presentation to the
Committee, Professor Bonnington of Monash University stressed the importance of
data-based collaboration, suggesting it is a more important component of
research collaboration than person-to-person interaction:
Videoconferencing is good, but
it has been designed for the sort of environment where we want to talk to somebody.
True research collaboration is actually about collaborating around the data.
You cannot actually represent that data through a video linkage very well—in
fact, it works very poorly … However, if you can push it through in other
forms, and even develop new technology that will go beyond what is available,
you are able to get new forms of collaboration happening.[45]
7.40
By way of example, Monash told the
Committee in its submission about the Australian National Data Service (ANDS),
a government-funded eResearch facility that provides a central repository of
data collections available to be used by research teams around the country.
ANDS seeks to ‘create the infrastructure to enable Australian researchers to
easily publish, discover, access and use research data’.[46]
Monash told the Committee that the benefits of
ANDS could increase significantly if bandwidth is made more widely available,
and the facility could even be used by schools for education purposes:
For society to obtain the
maximum benefit from these facilities, it is vital that they be utilised by as
many researchers as possible both within and beyond university circles … Making
greater bandwidth available to other educational sectors is critical to opening
up opportunities of this type.[47]
7.41
NICTA submitted that the NBN’s capacity to promote sharing and
manipulation of data outside the public sector research networks could have a
major positive effect on the formation of research partnerships and the
participation of private industry:
By upgrading broadband access
to every premise[s], the private sector will begin to have access to the kinds
of broadband performance and digital tools currently available largely to the
public sector innovation system. When connected, smaller private organisations
engaged in research could have affordable access to massive public sector
computational research clouds. This may encourage better operation of
ecosystems which mix the public and private sectors, most notably the ARC
Cooperative Research Centres and Industry Linkages programs.[48]
7.42
Cooperative Research Centres (CRCs) provide particularly good examples
of the type of research models that could flourish under the NBN. CRCs are
‘large, multi-participant collaborative organisations which operate from
multiple sites or nodes across Australia’. The CRC Committee, which provides
advice to the government on CRC funding and operational management, told the
Committee that collaboration between CRC participants would be enhanced by the
NBN:
CRC participants (research organisations and end-users) are
geographically dispersed. The NBN will generate efficiencies by making it
possible to use high definition, two-way real time video, opening up a new
dimension in terms of video meetings and the ability to concurrently work on data.
In addition, many CRC participants are international organisations and, to
participate economically and effectively in a CRC, need to be able to access
and interact with their CRC partners electronically. The NBN will facilitate
greater involvement of overseas participants.[49]
7.43
RMIT University also told the Committee about the potential for the NBN
to improve collaboration internationally, not just locally. Their submission
suggests that if the current limitations in connectivity can be overcome, similarly
to the business community (as discussed in Chapter 6), Australia’s research
community could actually benefit from being in a time zone that is offset from
North America and Europe:
Australia's geographical position has placed limitations on
international collaboration with peers around the globe. Multiple time zones
can enable international research teams to work on a problem around the clock.
However, limited communications have made it difficult to share large data
sets, to discuss technical problems and areas of contention in a timely manner.
NBN infrastructure has the potential to resolve this limitation for
collaboration with other NBN-enabled countries, giving Australian researchers a
stronger position in global research.[50]
Increased public engagement in science
7.44
An extension of the NBN’s capacity to extend the reach of research collaboration
to more people is its ability to facilitate a higher level of engagement of
ordinary people in science and research projects.
7.45
The Government of South Australia told the Committee about the Royal
Institution of Australia (RiAus), a science-outreach organisation based in
Adelaide. RiAus has a focus on promoting public awareness and understanding of
science by ‘bringing science to people and people to science’. Its media-rich
website, which includes streamed videos of its programs and lectures for those
who cannot attend in person, is expected to become more widely accessible when
the NBN is rolled out:
Video content such as that at RiAusOnDemand can only be
accessed with a fast internet connection. The NBN will ensure that such
opportunities to engage with Australian science are available in population
centres domestically, even overseas, as well as in more remote Australian
communities.[51]
7.46
Questacon, Australia’s National Science and Technology Centre, is also
largely focussed on engaging students and other members of the public in
science using online services, made possible through their fibre connectivity. Mr
Graham Smith, General Manager of Development at Questacon, told the Committee
about some of Questacon’s recent activities in online science engagement using
video-conferencing technologies:
We are on AARNet, so we have been able to make use of that
capability to reach a lot of schools. We have been using it for about 18
months, and trialling a variety of different formats. What we are able to do
now is link institutions such as CERN [the European Organization for Nuclear
Research], for instance, into schools. We have linked up with Japanese research
groups and taken, in a virtual sense, schools so that they can do live
interactive Q&As with international and Australian institutions. It is
quite remarkable, mainly because of the speed and the lack of delay.[52]
7.47
The Committee notes the extensive benefits accruing to Australian
students and teachers from such linkages with scientists in world-leading
research facilities, in multiple disciplines and locations. Apart from Mr
Smith’s reference to CERN, where the Large Hadron Collider is located, the
Committee heard that Questacon links online to Arctic and Antarctic scientists
participating in the global Polar Palooza event in Canberra and in the field in
Antarctica; and Cooperative Research Centres in the field of robotics.[53]
7.48
Mr Paul Nicholls, Director of Strategic Projects, Office of Research and
Development at Curtin University, told the Committee that if Australia is
successful in its bid to host the SKA, ordinary people with an NBN connection will
be able to participate in research related to the project through the ‘Skynet’
program.[54] See Box 7.2 for more
information.
Box 7.2 Skynet
‘Skynet’ is a citizens’ science program that will enable members of the public
to use their personal computers, with fast broadband connections, to help
process radio astronomy data generated by the Square Kilometre Array
(SKA). Not only would this assist professional SKA researchers with their
work, it could also have significant benefits for increasing the level of interest
of students in pursuing future science careers.
Mr Paul Nicholls of Curtin University explained that Skynet is ‘about
motivating students and teachers and helping them to participate in the
broader science field’. He added that ‘having teachers that can provide
context for students is really important: this is a real project that is really
happening’.
Source: Committee Hansard, Perth, 5 May 2011. |
7.49
A major long term benefit of this type of public engagement in science is
that it can provide motivation for young people to become involved in maths and
science careers, thereby increasing Australia’s long term capacity to undertake
leading-edge research. Monash University envisaged a scenario where Queensland
rainfall data was available to schools via ANDS:
Students returning to school after a flood event could be led
on a discovery process by their teachers examining historical and current
rainfall data. A football-mad student could use real sports statistics as a
pathway into understanding statistical problems generally. These immersive and
real world experiences that allow students to pursue an area of current
interest, or a long-held passion, may well be critical to forming their career
path. For some of them, this might be the transformative moment that sets them
on a career of research and discovery.[55]
Promoting application development
7.50
It is clear from the evidence noted above that the NBN has much to offer
the world of research and innovation in terms of providing infrastructure that
encourages R&D investment, equips researchers, and promotes better collaboration
and public engagement. It is also clear that the NBN has the potential to
promote innovation in a broad sense, increasing productivity across the economy
as innovative new products and ways of doing things are employed. The types of
specific applications that could be developed and utilised in Australia as a
result of the NBN are discussed in detail throughout the other chapters of this
report. However, the Committee heard from several inquiry participants that
government support is required to underpin the development and utilisation of these
broadband applications.
7.51
In terms of public sector R&D, there are a number of research
institutions around Australia that are focused on developing innovative new
applications based on broadband technologies, most of whom already receive
significant government support. DBCDE advised the Committee that such
institutions were taking pioneering roles in driving innovation ahead of
broader industry sectors:
For many potential users the benefits or value of the NBN is
in the network effect. For example it is only when a critical mass of customers
or clients is able to access the NBN that some firms will start to explore its
potential. However the work of organisations such as CSIRO, NICTA and IBES make
an important contribution to identifying and proving the ideas that innovative
firms will capitalise on in the medium term as the NBN rollout gets more
extensive.[56]
7.52
During the course of the inquiry, the Committee took the opportunity to
visit one of these institutions, the Institute of a Broadband-Enabled Society
(IBES). IBES is based at the University of Melbourne and receives additional
funding from both the Victorian Government and from industry partners. It is
focused on developing high-bandwidth solutions for a wide range of social and
economic applications. For more information on IBES, refer to Box 7.3 below.
Box 7.3 The Institute for a Broadband-Enabled Society (IBES)
IBES is a cross-disciplinary research institute dedicated to innovations in
products, services and end-user experiences that maximise the benefits of new
broadband technologies to Australian society. Research at the Institute focuses
on a wide range of fields including education and learning, health and
wellbeing, network deployment and economics, service and business
transformation and social infrastructure and communities.
The Institute was founded in July 2009 and is jointly funded by the University
of Melbourne and the Victorian State Government. The Society has stated that
the NBN will shape the delivery of education, provision of health care,
management of resources and connections with others.
Projects include Uni TV (see Box 4.4) which aims to deliver tertiary education
services through a web-based portal; development of e-health applications,
including youth mental health and wellbeing, tele-health and electronic health
records; natural resource and environmental management through the use of
sensor networks; and research into the community and social benefits of
broadband uptake including social inclusion and social diversity, improved
service delivery to urban, regional and remote communities, and the
development of innovative applications which find new uses for Australia’s
cultural heritage, but that also facilitate new possibilities for user-led
innovation.
Source: IBES, Submission 84. |
7.53
In December 2010, an institution with a similar mandate to IBES, the
Australian Centre for Broadband Innovation (ACBI), was launched in Sydney. ACBI
was established by CSIRO in partnership with NICTA and the NSW Government. ACBI
will ‘develop and trial new applications and services for the NBN with a
particular focus on regional service delivery’.[57]
CSIRO and NICTA are also developing new high-bandwidth applications independently.
7.54
The Committee heard that there is further scope for investment in
research and development of broadband applications for particular industry
sectors and to address particular issues. While NBN-enabled applications for
the agricultural sector are discussed more broadly in Chapter 6, the Committee
notes at this point their particular relationship to R&D. The National
Farmers Federation told the Committee that:
Commercial and export opportunities may exist in the
development of … applications to improve the efficiency and productivity of
Australian agriculture. Some work has been undertaken by the CSIRO ICT centre
on the use of information technology in agriculture, including virtual fencing,
bull separation, pasture management, water quality monitoring and agricultural
robotics. However, significant further work is required; particularly research
and development work in partnership with farmers.[58]
7.55
Mr Nicholls of Curtin University also told the Committee that more
investment in application development will be required: ‘the biggest issue in
securing the potential is a lack of investment in development of quality
content and quality research’.[59] In its submission, Curtin
University expressed interest in contributing to an ‘Australian National
Broadband Strategic Research Facility’, which would focus on providing content
for the NBN to ‘providing major city levels of service, especially those
services delivered by Government, to all Australians’.[60]
7.56
With regards to the private sector, the Committee heard from some
organisations that although fast, ubiquitous broadband would enable innovation
to take place, the infrastructure of the NBN alone would not be enough to drive
innovation to the maximum extent possible.
7.57
The Business Council of Australia (BCA) submitted that ICT ‘was critical
to Australia’s improved productivity performance during the 1990s’ and ‘will
continue to make an important contribution’.[61] However, BCA also noted
that Australia’s taxation system and regulatory frameworks are at least as
important as infrastructure like the NBN in promoting productivity-enhancing
ICT investments.[62] BCA wrote:
The first step in using ICT as an enabler for productivity
growth should be to ensure that Australia’s taxation system and regulatory
framework adequately support ICT innovation and investment. The regulatory
framework encompasses not just regulations but the wide range of government
settings that affect the incentives of firms, such as funding arrangements,
supply quotas and price caps.[63]
7.58
Scientific Applications International Corporation (SAIC), a large
US-based scientific, engineering and technology company, cautioned that the
NBN’s large potential to be a ‘platform for innovation’ would only be maximised
if the Government acts to focus application development on ‘forging new
partnerships between industry, universities, and national laboratories’.[64]
SAIC explained:
While we believe that Australian government R&D and
university institutions are positioned to advance the state-of-the-art in many
aspects that touch on the NBN, we have taken a position … that the opportunity
exists to exercise a new R&D investment paradigm when it comes to the NBN.
The R&D investment for the NBN could involve industry and the extending competition
for R&D funds on an equal footing between government labs, universities, and
industry (small and large) could greatly enhance the outcomes of the
investments. The government should encourage collaboration among these
institutions, and commercialisation should be emphasised in order to turn these
investment dollars into enduring Australian jobs.
The government could also consider an R&D framework that
allows private funding to augment public investment …[65]
7.59
Optus submitted that in addition to government support for development
of broadband applications, ‘further assistance for commercialisation of NBN
services and applications will help see these ideas through to market’.[66]
7.60
The ITIIC told the Committee that if businesses can lift their level of
innovation by leveraging the NBN, there is a ‘considerable opportunity for the
local IT industry’ to develop high-bandwidth software applications. These applications
could be exported to the world, shifting the balance away from Australia’s
traditional status as being ‘great users but not producers of ICT’.[67]
Committee conclusions
7.61
The Committee received convincing evidence that the NBN will provide a critical
enabling platform for improving Australia’s R&D and innovation performance.
7.62
As a world class, high speed and ubiquitous network, the NBN will
provide incentives for foreign companies to set up research and development
facilities in Australia. These investments are already becoming apparent, with
IBM recently launching a Global Research and Development Laboratory in
Australia. The Square Kilometre Array project will represent a major investment
in Australia’s research capabilities, should Australia’s bid be successful.
7.63
The NBN will also provide opportunities to improve the way research and
development is undertaken in Australia. The ubiquity of the network will enable
research to be undertaken in places where it is currently limited by geography
and lack of connectivity. The NBN’s satellite component, in particular, will
enable a much higher quality environmental science to take place in remote
areas. By extending high speed broadband outside the major research campuses,
the NBN will enable vast improvements to the ability of researchers to
collaborate with stakeholders in private industry and the broader community, a
widely acknowledged area of weakness in Australia’s current research
activities. By connecting fibre to homes and schools, the NBN will also enable
an increased level of engagement in science with the general public, which has
the potential to improve the level of interest in high-demand science- and
mathematics-based careers.
7.64
Furthermore, the NBN will provide Australia with the opportunity to lead
the world in the development of applications that use high-speed broadband
across all sectors of society, including business, education and environmental
management. Such development could lead to improved export outcomes for
Australia’s ICT sector. According to the OECD, Australia’s export of ICT
products as a proportion of total merchandise exports is currently among the
lowest in the world, at only 1.5 per cent, compared to 27 per cent in South
Korea.[68] The NBN will be an
important factor in driving a higher level of ICT exports.
7.65
For this potential to be realised, the Committee recognises there is a
need for continued government support for organisations, such as IBES and ACBI,
which are involved in developing applications to utilise the NBN.
7.66
The Committee also recognises that, provided appropriate regulatory
structures are in place, the NBN has the potential to underpin resurgence in
private sector R&D investment.
7.67
Given the high level of potential benefit to the research community that
the NBN offers, particularly due to its ubiquitous coverage, the scientific
community should be seen as an important stakeholder during the NBN’s design
and rollout. There is already a precedent for this: during the recent
construction of the RBBP fibre link from Geraldton to Perth, CSIRO, AARNet and
DBCDE co-operated to ensure that additional capacity was built into the fibre
route to enable use by the SKA project. Other examples of where these types of mutually
beneficial arrangements can be made could include allowing NBN satellites to
carry additional ‘hosted payloads’ that would be able to increase scientific
outcomes for little additional cost. The Government and NBN Co should recognise
the potential value of their infrastructure to the research sector and maintain
ongoing dialogue with representative research bodies to identify how the
potential benefits can be maximised in the NBN’s final design.