Bandwidth export may begin in Sept

Bangladesh Submarine Cable Company Ltd (BSCCL) will start exporting bandwidth -- 10 gigabits per second -- to the northeastern Indian state of Tripura by September, as Bangladesh and India inked a deal yesterday.

BSCCL will export the bandwidth at $10 per mbps—which is 33 percent higher than its local market price—and earn $1.2 million or Tk 9.6 crore in a year.The state-owned company will get the payment in advance at the beginning of every quarter, said its Managing Director Monwar Hossain.

Hossain and Anupam Shrivastava, chairman and managing director of Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd or BSNL, inked the deal at a programme at Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's official residence, Gono Bhaban, in the capital.

The deal is initially signed for a year and can be extended for two more years, Hossain said.

On May 12 last year, both the sides signed a memorandum of understanding in Dhaka, after a two-year discussion.

BSNL's initial plan was to take tele-transit. It wanted to use Bangladesh's network infrastructure to facilitate telecommunication between Kolkata and Agartala.

But BSCCL disagreed and offered the Indian company the bandwidth.

“The bandwidth price will be reviewed after a year.”

According to the deal approved by the cabinet in April this year, a link needs to be established through Akhaura under Brahmanbaria district to Agartala, the capital of Tripura.

The Bangladeshi company has connectivity up to Akhaura, but the link may not have the capacity to carry the huge volume of bandwidth, he said.

So, the required connectivity should be established before the export begins, he said.

He expects India will take 40 gbps of bandwidth in the next six months, which may reach 100 gbps with the establishment of connection between Bangladesh and the second submarine consortium—SEA-ME-WE-5—by 2016.

Bangladesh got connected with SEA-ME-WE-4 in 2006 at a cost of $63 million; BSCCL earned the amount back in three years, and whatever they are earning now is their profit, he said.

BSCCL has already selected two other points to establish links with Shillong and Assam, Hossain said.

The country consumes more than 100 gbps now, of which 33 gbps come from BSCCL, which has a capacity of 200 gbps.

The rest of the demand is met by import from the western part of India, mainly Mumbai, by six international terrestrial cable companies.

BSCCL has plans to export bandwidth to Italy and other countries also.