NBN will put Australia's head in clouds

BUSINESS editor Maureen Shelley and research writer Joshua Grech joined Netgear CEO Patrick Lo for lunch at the iconic Cafe Sydney restaurant.

Nasdaq-listed Netgear is a computer networking equipment company with a market value of $US1.2 billion. It's chief salesman and CEO Patrick Lo is in Sydney to talk about the future of computer networking. He spoke exclusively to The Daily Telegraph about the National Broadband Network.

ONE of the world's most successful Wi-Fi computer networking bosses has heaped praise on the Federal Government's National Broadband Network saying it will likely lead to a cloud computing "gold rush".

Netgear founder and CEO Patrick Lo yesterday said it was possible to build a wireless network that could provide the same speeds as the fibre-to-the-home network the government is currently rolling out.

Mr Lo said alternative plans, just as continuing to use the copper network or using a wireless network, would not cope with the demands of the nearly future as more and more people produce and consume more and more data.

"I think the controversy lies in whether the network should be built by government or the private sector," he said.

The network

Mr Lo said afterwards the network was rolled out, there would be a boom in cloud services because everyone would have such a robust internet connection.

The Netgear boss - who has made big bets that TV over the internet will be the then and there big thing - as well said that research powerhouse Apple would be better off without its leader Steve Jobs and the Android platform would swamp Apple's iOS mobile operating system.

Mr Lo, who admitted that "Apple doesn't give me the time of day", said an open community just as Android will always prosper more than Apple's closed community.

"During Steve Jobs remains, Apple will remain a closed system," Mr Lo said during discussing the difficulties of trying to stream content bought on Apple's iTunes store on non-Apple device.

The networking boss said he believed Android

The networking boss said he believed Android would become the dominant operating system, not just on smartphones now on all consumer electronics, which will begin being connected to the internet in the then and there few years, because it is so open.

Mr Lo said he wasn't anti-Apple and pointed out that Netgear was the first non-Apple hardware maker that supported Apple's Time Machine backup function.