is telstra going to bid?, page-7

It's clear to me that TLS will put in a NON COMPLIANT bid which specifically says that the offer is only valid with an integrated TLS. As I understand it the bid asks bidders to select the type of environment in which the bid is valid and as such a bid may still be considered to be compliant if TLS insist integration is a primary caveat. Either way it throws the decision over to Conroy. Either he accepts it and the NBN is built by TLS or he doesn't and the whole thing is a complete mess and we go to court for several years. The final alternative is that Conroy drops the whole thing (IMO this is what Terria really wants). From Terria's viewpoint it has been reported that they (and the others of the original G9) are saving a vast amount of money by living off TLS on the ULL, which TLS says is underpriced courtesy of the regulator. Consequently I would see it that all Terria wants is for the whole thing to be delayed (or better still abandoned). Their problem would be if they were given the project and had to raise the money and do something (the last Liberal government has already been down this path with Elders/Optus who reportedly sat on their hands). IMO Terria must know that in that event they win they would not be called on to do anything since the whole thing would be in court for many years as the government attempted to "declare" that the TLS conduits and network could be used by third parties. If push came to shove TLS could immediately insist that this would create interferance (noise on their cables) with their existing network and demand compensation and would of course say that they were not joining the project making the NBN non-viable from a commercial standpoint. In addition TLS could point to a bundle of technical information the size of Mount Everest and say to Terria (and/or the government) that they could look in that paper/computer mountain (distributed across Australia) and might find what they were looking for - but would not get any help from TLS; IMO they would be at it for ever more and would be likely either not to find what they were looking for or get the wrong information. IMO the logistics of this going to anyone other than TLS (or the whole enterprise being abandoned) would be a nightmare.