Australian Navy awards $20m contract to Telstra branch

28.06.2006
In an IT services contract worth A$20 million (US$14.6 million) the Royal Australian Navy's Fleet Information Systems Support Organization (FISSO) will provide mail services for all 60 Australian Naval ships.

The contract, initially for three years with a possible two-year extension, was announced today by Telstra Ltd. subsidiary KAZ.

FISSO currently provides a range of services to the Navy including real-time chat and e-mail, and ship location information during wartime. This new contract will allow sailors to access satellite-based Web services including e-mail and Internet content. All information is screened for appropriate content and is integrated with defense-class antispam and antivirus products. Sailors will only be able to access e-mail and Internet content via government-owned satellites intermittently.

KAZ service delivery manager Ian Rose said the contract solely supports the warship and crew when at sea. When docked, a 10MB pipe connects a ship to the maritime network.

"We are basically supporting an office environment which moves and has a fully supported LAN on board; the ships could be anywhere from here to the gulf," Rose said.

"Our prime role is to support the ships at sea, although we do run a supported gateway between sea and land. Not all ships can be up all the time (on satellite communications), but basically each ship is its own domain and operates on a stand-alone basis.