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2007 Communications Alliance & CommsDay Awards: The ACOMMS

Nominations have opened for the Australian telecommunications industry’s premiere awards, presented by Communications Alliance and Communications Day. Communications Alliance CEO Anne Hurley unveiled the new look awards, re-branded the ACOMM Awards at the CommsDay Summit in Sydney and declared nominations open for 2007.  The aim of the ACOMM Awards is to: • Encourage continuous improvement within the industry • Celebrate individual excellence within the Australian telecommunications sector • Create community awareness by drawing attention to performance of outstanding individuals and organisations • Create international awareness of the progress and success of our industry within the region.

Communications Alliance, which came from the merger of ACIF and SPAN in September 2006, is focused on providing a unified voice for the industry particularly in areas of competition, innovation and industry development.  The ACOMMS reflect that agenda.

Decisive Publishing CEO Grahame Lynch said ‘the Australian telecom industry has its fair share of negativity and argument, to the extent that we sometimes forget the many outstanding success stories out there. The ACOMM awards are a day where we can put the day-to-day debate aside and shine a light on excellence and innovation.  Communications Alliance has taken many positive steps to build industry co-operation and foster excellent".

The ACOMM Awards will continue to recognise industry excellence delivered to consumers and business users by service providers; carriers, technology partners, consultants and third party suppliers.

Award nominations are open to all participants in the Australian telecommunications industry across nine categories including the hotly contested ‘Telecommunications Ambassador of the Year’ award presented for outstanding individual leadership contribution during the year.  Previous Ambassador’s include Macquarie Telecommunications’ Maha Krishnapillai (2005) and ATUG’s Rosemary Sinclair (2006).

The Award categories include:

Telecommunications Carrier/Service Provider Awards of Excellence - open to carriers and/or service providers
• Competition and Growth - Large Company
• Competition and Growth - SME
• Innovation - Large Company
• Innovation - SME
• Innovation – Mobility

Telecommunications Industry Awards of Excellence - open to technology partners, professional services organisations and application service providers
• Services to Industry - Professional Services
• Services to Industry – Third Party Suppliers  
• Services to Customers – Best Customer Service initiative

Individual Award
• Telecommunications Ambassador of the Year

Nominations for the awards close on May 31. Full details of the awards and criteria are available at www.commsalliance.com.au/the_acomm_awards .

The judging panel for the 2007 awards includes Communications Alliance CEO Anne Hurley, Decisive Publishing CEO Grahame Lynch, KPMG Partner Malcolm Alder, Communications Day Editor Natalie Apostolou, AIIA CEO Sheryle Moon and Matrixview CEO Noel Robertson.

The Awards will be announced and presented at the Communications Alliance/CommsDay Annual Dinner at the Four Seasons Hotel in Sydney on Thursday 19 July 2007. 

Information on Accessibility Features for Telephone Equipment
The Information on Accessibility Features for Telephone Equipment Industry Code (ACIF C625:2005) comes into effect on 12 April 2007.  The Code, registered in October last year, requires equipment suppliers (manufacturers and importers) to provide information to Carriage Service Providers about the features of their equipment that would assist people with special communications needs.  The Code also requires Carriage Service Providers to provide that information on equipment features to consumers on request. The Code applies to all customer equipment for use with the Standard Telephone Service that incorporates a telephone handset.

An accompanying Industry Guideline, Operational Matrices for Reporting on Accessibility Features for Telephone Equipment (ACIF G627:2005) lists the features that are to be included in the information. Communications Alliance has established the Information Accessibility Administration Group (the IAAG) to monitor the implementation of this Guideline. The IAAG will also monitor developments in the equipment industry to identify and recommend changes to the Industry Guideline, as appropriate.

ACCC on Broadband Speed Advertising
The first industry briefing on Broadband Speed Advertising was delivered by the ACCC in Sydney, this week. Communications Alliance teamed up with the Internet Industry Association to co-host the briefing which was well received by all who attended.

The briefing followed on from the ACCC information paper issued in January and focussed on the requirements of Sections 51 and 52 of the Trade Practices Act which state that corporations must have good grounds for making claims regarding broadband speeds and that no advertising material should be misleading or deceptive.
This was a highly successful briefing and we hope to be able to offer a further event in Melbourne in the next few weeks.

Trial of SMS to selected Local Rate (13/1300) Numbers commences
A six month industry pilot allowing consumers to send SMS messages to a limited number of corporate local rate (13/1300) numbers commenced in April under the auspices of Communications Alliance.  This is believed to make Australia the first country globally to offer SMS usage of its local-rate number range.

Currently the 13/1300 range is restricted to voice traffic while the 191 to 199 range can be used for SMS by some, but not all, mobile customers.

Communications Alliance, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA), Industry Number Management Services (INMS), mobile operators, existing local-rate service providers, European SMS response specialists TXT4 and mobile aggregator Sybase 365 have been working together over the past few months on offering corporates the ability to have local-rate numbers SMS enabled.

Factsheets have been developed to provide more information on the trial for consumers and corporate clients.  To view the Factsheets go to www.commsalliance.com.au/about_us/factsheets.