08 September 2022

Bangladesh will implement a ban on manufacturing and importing 3G devices in a bid to drive smartphone adoption, the country’s telecom watchdog said.

A report in The Dhaka Tribune said a ban introduced by the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) will come into force from January 1, 2023, as the regulator believes that use of 3G-only devices is slowing the spread of 4G networks in the country.

BTRC data indicated that just a few thousand 3G devices were manufactured in Bangladesh this year, but some importers are still shipping them into the country.

However, local firms are also reducing their production of smartphones while increasing their manufacture of feature phones despite the push towards 4G and 5G.

The Tribune said of all the handsets manufactured in Bangladesh, 30.40% are smartphones while 69.60% are feature phones. In June this year, this translated respectively to 880,000 4G/5G devices and 2.15 million 2G feature phones.

According to latest figures GSMA Intelligence, Bangladesh’s total mobile users stood at 182 million at end-June 2022, of which almost half were feature phone users. The country has slightly more 2G connections than 4G connections – 75 million compared to 73.5 million. Meanwhile, 3G connections were circa 33.5 million at the end of Q2 2022.