Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) marked a new milestone by continuing its activities at its own address after 21 years in 2023. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina inaugurated the building virtually from Ganobhaban on August 20. National Roaming was launched for the first time in the country in the following month. After broadband this year, the intense discussion about the price package of mobile internet will be remembered in history. Arguments went on till the last day of the year as the maximum duration of the special day package to be 7 days by canceling the 3-day package from the night of October 15. Besides, the incident of fire on the 14th floor of Khawaja Tower in Mohakhali on October 26 shook the country’s telecom sector. The country’s internet system was challenged as the offices of 25 major ISPs, several Interconnection Exchanges (ICX) and 2 data centers were damaged in this building.
On the other hand, Bangladesh Submarine Cables PLC (BSCPLC), an autonomous organization under the Ministry of Posts, Telecommunications and Information Technology, further fueled the controversy by limiting the bandwidth to 500 Gbps (Gigabit per second) on the night before the holiday while collecting the dues of 19 International Internet Gateway (IIG) companies of the country. The non-commercial debut of 5G Also came in discussion throughout the year.
However, overcoming all these arguments, the telecom sector ended the year 2023 with 13 crore 14 lakh 4 thousand active internet connections across the country. Among them, broadband connections were 1 crore 24 lakh 9 thousand. As a result, Bangladesh welcomes the year 2024 with more than 15 crore people connected to the Internet. 19 crore 3 lakh 60 thousand customers are taking mobile service from 4 operators of the country. In addition to the increase in the number of customers, some good news came this year. The public fear of radiation has subsided amid the publication of regular test reports. State-owned mobile operator Teletalk started strengthening the operator’s network sharing through mobile tower share. On November 1, the then Minister of Posts and Telecommunications, Mostafa Jabbar, along with senior officials of BTRC inaugurated the Banglalink-Teletalk network sharing service. Grameenphone, the country’s largest mobile phone operator, unveiled 8 IoT (Internet of Things) products in December. And Robi Axiata ensures the highest 4G coverage (98.5 percent) among mobile operators with more than 16 thousand 600 4G sites across the country.
In view of customer complaints, BTRC directed to keep the price of internet packages fixed by 10 November and make the packages valid for 3 days instead of 7 days. Besides, it was also clarified that the prices of the packages which have increased will be brought back to the pre-October 14 status. Posts and Telecommunications Minister Mustafa Jabbar resigned as a technocrat minister ahead of the elections this month. In his place, Zunaid Ahmed Palak, State Minister for Information and Communication Technology, was given additional responsibility as the state minister. Engineer Mohiuddin Ahmed has been appointed as the Chairman in place of Shyam Sundar Sikder after being promoted from the post of Vice Chairman of BTRC.
However, in the meantime, Starlink, a subsidiary of SpaceX, the space agency of the world’s top technology entrepreneur Elon Musk, came up in the discussion after the first meeting after assuming the new responsibility as the state minister. They have been trying to enter the Bangladesh market for two years. However, Starlink internet service was tested for the first time in Bangladesh at the ICT Tower in July. At that time, SpaceX’s Global Government Affairs Manager Joel Meredith and Global Licensing and Activation Manager Pernil Urdhawareshe met Bangladesh Satellite Company Limited (BSCL) Chairman Shahjahan Mahmud and ICT State Minister Zunaid Ahmed Palak. However, the entrepreneurs of the telecom sector have been opposing it since the beginning.