Telstra hits halfway mark in 'Top Hat' ADSL2+ upgrade

Telstra has reached the halfway point of its $80 million 'Top Hat' street side cabinet extension program that aims to bring ADSL2+ services to more users.

Telstra field technicians install a 'Top Hat' extension (Video grab courtesy Telstra).

The telco revealed the 'Top Hat' program last November, saying it would upgrade approximately 2000 cabinets over 18 months.

The program is called 'Top Hat' because it involves affixing a smaller cabinet on top of the existing street side cabinet, making it capable of supporting more than 480 telephone services.

The program appears to be running on time, having gone live with its 1000th 'Top Hat' after 10 months of rollout.

The milestone 'Top Hat' was brought online in the NSW South Coast town of Moruya.

"By the end of the year, we'll have upgraded around 1850 street side cabinets and more than 350,000 fixed broadband services through the project," Telstra's executive director of networks & access technologies Mike Wright said.