Abstract

The New Zealand telecommunications market is currently defined by a tactical skirmish between fibre and Fixed Wireless Access (FWA), largely fought on the basis of price. This focus, however, obscures a far more significant strategic disruption on the horizon: a demand shock driven by the mainstream adoption of Artificial Intelligence. While the precise timing and nature of AI’s impact on network traffic remain difficult to predict, it is implausible to assume that demand for speed, latency, and symmetrical bandwidth will not change dramatically over the next decade. This report argues that the current FWA-fibre debate is a prelude to a fundamental re-evaluation of telecommunications infrastructure, where the strategic value of assets will be determined by their capacity to handle the uncertain, yet inevitable, demands of an AI-powered world.