The Bangladesh government hopes to start the test-run of fifth generation (5G) mobile network within this year, says Telecoms Minister Mustafa Jabbar.
The announcement comes just nearly four months into the country 4G wireless network after the telecoms regulator licensed four operators, who are yet to bring the who country under 4G coverage.
Jabbar, who also holds the portfolio of ICT, made the announcement on Tuesday, when he inaugurated the new offices of the Bangladesh ICT Journalist Forum in Dhaka. “We have already rolled out 4G, so we need to start the next phase, which is 5G.”
On Feb 19 this year, Bangladesh caught up with 76 other countries when it switched on its first 4G mobile network with the promises of internet connections for smartphones and tablets at several times the average speed of 3G services.
Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) licensed four operators for 4G services — Grameenphone, Robi, Banglalink and state-owned Teletalk.
According to the BTRC, the monthly average usage of data by a mobile internet user was below 100Mb when 3G services were launched more than four years ago, and now it is around 700Mb.
In Bangladesh, 70 percent of the mobile-phone users use feature phones while the remaining 30 percent have smartphones, with 10 percent of those being 3G-enabled.