A NEW telecommunications company has shunned the bright lights and busy streets of Australian cities, choosing instead to base itself in Albany.
Australian Unified Services will locate its head office and principal place of business in the State’s far south after examining the bottom-line costs of Albany in comparison to Sydney, Melbourne and Perth.
“The fact is we are in the telecommunications business and we can locate ourselves anywhere in Australia,” AUS founder and owner Alistair Birch said. “And in Albany the general property prices and the everyday costs of running the company are cheaper, especially in the company’s start-up phase.”
Prices were not only better for the business, but also for the employees.
“We will have staff looking for houses, and they are cheaper here,” Mr Birch said.
“We are in a competitive industry and anything that reduces the costs for our business and our employees is good for us.”
AUS specialises in developing value-adding services to Internet service providers and web hosting companies. Some of its products include domain names and web-to-fax and web-to-SMS gateways. Mr Birch said Albany had everything the company needed and the telecommunications infrastructure was second to none.
And, while AUS’s decision may be unusual in the Australian business landscape, regional cities were becoming increasingly popular homes for telecommunication companies in Europe.
“As long as the infrastructure is there it doesn’t matter where they are located ... the business does not rely on personal contact,” Mr Birch said.
