Optus has urged Netflix, Inc. (NASDAQ:NFLX) to pay for speed guarantees. As per the reports, Allen Lew, Chief Executive Officer, Optus has stated that his company looks forward to considering a high charge for world-class services like Netflix to guarantee higher speeds.
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It’s been quite some time since Netflix launched services in Australia. But Optus and iiNet have not counted the data which has been used to access the services for monthly data allowance of their customers on the fixed networks. The matter is similar to what’s trending around the world now i.e. net neutrality. Netflix has expressed its disagreement on that discussion and stated that it’s against the stance of the company on net neutrality.
The primary concept of net neutrality is that all the network providers should equally treat the traffic that comes from different sources. It is essential to ensure that customers continue to get access to all the internet based services uninterruptedly. Net neutrality creates a fair marketplace where every internet based service provider witness’s equal competition and is given ample chances to serve the customers in the best possible way.
Australia has responded positively to Netflix since its launch. iiNet has unveiled that 25% of its traffic is from Netflix. While talking to reporters during the CommsDay Summit conference, Lew stated that Optus would think about charging ‘premier’ service on the network to ensure that HD streaming can be managed without any hassle. He claimed that Optus was in the favor of net neutrality, but at the same time it just wanted to figure out a possibility of providing the premium service to customers without any hassle.
According to him, Netflix and other service providers should collaborate with Optus in order to make sure that customers continue to get uninterrupted services at a cheap cost in the future. Netflix hasn’t given any response on Allen Lew’s comments.