iPrimus, a Vocus Retail business, is celebrating its 25^th birthday in Australia with the launch of new retail offers – just six months after deactivating the final dial-up service on Australia’s first competitive fixed-line network.

“iPrimus has been a pioneer since the very first day of competition in the Australian telecoms market, and we’re still going strong 25 years on,” said Vocus Retail chief executive Antony de Jong.

To celebrate 25 years in Australia, iPrimus is offering a $25 credit for new and existing customers who purchase a new broadband service, or mobile service (when bundled with new and existing broadband services). Offer ends 31 August 2022[1].

“iPrimus is Australia’s original broadband challenger brand, and that spirit is alive and well today,” said Mr de Jong. “iPrimus was recently awarded ‘Best Rated Broadband Provider’ by Finder.com.au, based on how well it performed across customer service, reliability, speed and value for money.”

Primus Telecom was among Australia’s first competitive carriers, being granted the sixth telecommunications carrier licence when the market was opened to competition on 1 July 1997.

In 1999 Primus Telecom launched the iPrimus brand to serve the residential market, while retaining the Primus Telecom brand for the business communications market.

iPrimus established its credentials as an industry trailblazer in the years that followed, establishing the first competitive fixed-line infrastructure network to Telstra. iPrimus deployed one of the largest DSLAM footprints in Australia, enabling it to deliver voice, dial-up, and ADSL services on its own network.

The final iPrimus dial-up connection was deactivated just over six months ago on 10 December 2021. Over 250 iPrimus DSLAMs remain active to this day, with more than 2,000 ADSL services still connected to the iPrimus network. This network is being progressively decommissioned as services migrate to the NBN.

At its peak, the iPrimus voice, dial-up internet, and ADSL network saw DSLAM infrastructure installed in more than 280 exchanges, reaching 2.3 million Australian premises – almost a third of premises at the time. The Primus Telecom business fibre network reached 5,000 buildings in five capital cities – covering some 75% of business premises.

iPrimus pioneered new services such as bundled voice and dial-up in the early days of the internet, as well as being the first competitive carrier to launch bundled voice and ADSL. iPrimus connected the first commercial customer to the NBN when services launched in Tasmania in May 2012.

Primus Telecom was purchased by M2 Group in 2012, with M2 Group becoming part of Vocus Group via merger in 2016.

Vocus is Australia’s fourth-largest NBN retail service provider with 7.3% market share and close to 640,000 services in operation across its wholesale and retail businesses.

[1] Available on Broadband Plans for new and existing customers adding a new broadband service and on Mobile Plans for new and existing broadband customers adding a new mobile service. Max 3 new mobile services per account. Excludes Lite Plan.