Bangladesh adds 1.66 mn mobile phone subscribers in June

Tag: Cdma Mobile Phone

DHAKA: Bangladesh's six mobile phone operators signed up a total 1.66 mn new subscribers in June, lifting the user base to 43.70 mn in one of the Asia's fastest-growing cellular markets, telecoms regulator data showed on Sunday.

Top mobile phone company Grameenphone, majority owned by Norway's Telenor, raised its subscriber base to 20.31 mn in June from 19.58 mn a month ago. No 2 player Egyptian Orascom Telecom's Banglalink signed up 470,000 new users in June to take its total to 9.46 mn.

Third-ranked Aktel, majority owned by Telekom Malaysia International, added 140,000 users, taking its user base to 7.85 mn at end-June. Warid Telecom International of the United Arab Emirates, which launched Bangladesh operations in May 2007, ended June with 3.31 mn from 3.13 mn users.

The only CDMA carrier CityCell, a joint venture between Pacific Bangladesh Telecom Limited and Singapore Telecommunication, grew to 1.70 mn users in June from 1.64 mn in May. State-owned Teletalk's user base stood at 1.07 mn in June.

The number of mobile users rose nearly 58 per cent in 2007 to 34.4 mn, the Bangladesh Telecom Regulatory Commission said, helped by competitive tariffs and cheap handsets.

Impoverished Bangladesh has the lowest average monthly cost for mobile telephone use at all levels of use -- low, medium, and high -- for prepaid and postpaid tariff plans, according to a recent report titled 'Mobile Benchmark Studies in South Asia and Latin America'.