Mobiles are ringing and data is flowing for the first time at Cathcart with state of the art mobile technology now available in the area through Telstra's rollout of the Federal Government's Mobile Black Spot Program.
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Telstra area general manager Chris Taylor said the new mobile base station will bring new and improved coverage to the area and is among more than 650 sites being delivered by Telstra across the nation under the Program.
"This is an important moment for residents, businesses and visitors to Cathcart who can now make, receive mobile calls and access high speed mobile broadband using Telstra's latest 3G and 4GX services," Mr Taylor said.
"Mobile connectivity plays a major role in connecting friends and families, businesses, farms, tourist spots and essential services across Australia and around the world.
"Whether it's a parent being able to call the kids, a small business taking a credit card payment for the first time or a local producer using sensors to run their farm more effectively, mobile connectivity is becoming increasingly important for growth and stability in regional Australia.
Telstra has delivered more than 500 mobile base stations under the Federal Government's Mobile Black Spot Program, as well as more than 200 4G small cells, expanding mobile coverage to regional communities across Australia by more than 160,000 sq. km.
"Since we switched on our first base stations as part of this program in December 2015, there have now been in excess of 100 million calls carried and more than 5,000 terabytes of data downloaded," Mr Taylor said.
"That's the equivalent of customers downloading more than a million HD movies or a billion songs."
Mr Taylor said Telstra's $260 million contribution to the Mobile Black Spot Program, more than double the commitment of all other carriers combined, complements its own direct investment in building Australia's largest and fastest mobile network, which now covers more than 2.5 million square kilometres.
In addition to more than 650 mobile base stations to be delivered under the Mobile Black Spot Program, Telstra is continuing to install up to 250 Small Cells to deliver high speed 4G data services and mobile voice services for those with VoLTE enabled devices in some small country towns where suitable Telstra infrastructure is available.