The government yesterday approved four applications for tower operations licences as part of its move to separate the network business from telecom services with the view to rationalising the number of towers in the country.

A uniform minimum call rate of Tk 0.45 per-minute for mobile phones is going to be effective from early hours of Tuesday as the government approved the fresh tariff to establish a level playing field for the country's telecom operators.

Grameenphone crosses seven crore active mobile connections in Bangladesh, a magic figure for any mobile operators even in the global perspective.

All is set for Symphony to start assembling mobile handsets in Bangladesh as the leading vendor has already set up the plant in Ashulia.

With audits into Grameenphone and Robi's books already complete, Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) is on way to appointing firms to get the same done for Banglalink and Airtel.

Grameenphone's alleged financial discrepancies have ballooned almost three times to Tk 11,530.15 crore after the telecom regulator ran another audit of the operator's books.

Robi has been asked to pay Tk 867.24 crore to the telecom regulator and the revenue collector as missed or under payments over a 19-year period, detected after a thorough audit.

The government has fixed Tk 0.50 as the minimum rate that mobile operators can charge per minute for calls to any network, creating a level playing field for carriers ahead of the launch of the mobile number portability service.

Chinese handset-maker Huawei launched its popular smartphone—Huawei nova 3i—at an event at the Pan Pacific Sonargaon in the capital yesterday.

South Asia's first test run of fifth generation (5G) mobile internet took place in Dhaka yesterday when download speeds of up to 4.17 gigabits per second were experienced.

Samsung has entered Bangladesh's mobile phone accessories market by launching its original ancillary products in order to cater the growing number of digital device users.

Grameenphone's net profit rose 36.3 percent year-on-year to Tk 1,080.44 crore in the April-June period, the highest in a single quarter in the operator's history, helped by an unused portion of tax provisioning as well as growth in voice and data revenue.

The telecom regulator has stepped in to protect customers by way of stopping mobile phone operators from confusing subscribers with hundreds of voice and data offers.

The BTRC has issued two notices within a span of seven days asking Grameenphone, Robi and Banglalink to explain why an Eid-ul-Fitr greeting of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina had not been sent out to subscribers.

The world's biggest mobile factory was launched yesterday in Noida, a satellite township of New Delhi, jointly by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and visiting South Korean President Moon Jae.

A good number of foreign mobile value-added services companies that repatriate a significant amount of funds from Bangladesh will face regulatory bar as the telecom regulator is set to introduce licensing for the business.

Bangabandhu-1 satellite's first commercial service is scheduled to begin in September when it will be connecting vessels navigating in the Bay of Bengal and around the country to each other and to inland ports.

The Bangladesh Association of Software and Information Services (BASIS) yesterday launched a second national ICT award for 2018 to recognise outstanding achievements of individuals and entrepreneurs.

Qubee is handing over 20,000 individual subscribers to its main competitor under a revenue sharing model as the wireless broadband service provider is seeking to reshape its business to survive the onslaught of high-speed mobile internet.

The government now plans to go for a trial run of 5G mobile technology, which has caused the mobile users to raise an eyebrow, as its predecessor -- 4G -- is yet to cover major parts of the country.