State-owned mobile phone operator Teletalk, which has brought all 64 district headquarters of the country under its third generation broadband coverage, is now seeking more loans from China to further improve its network service.
The estimated amount of the loans will be Tk780 crore.
A high-level Teletalk team leaves Dhaka this morning for China, which will visit different companies including Huawei.
“We have a bigger plan about development of our network and for this we need make further investment,” Teletalk’s acting managing director Gias Uddin Ahmed told Dhaka Tribune yesterday.
“The operator has managed to reach all 64 district headquarters with its 3G coverage this month (January). But the coverage is still very limited and may not be able to satisfy subscribers,” he added.
Teletalk sources said the operator have so far established around 3,800 base stations across the country. But it needs at least 7,000 base stations to bring satisfactory service to its customers, according to them.
“In China we will visit some factories. After returning home, we will finalise our decision (on taking foreign loans),” the acting MD said.
Earlier, Teletalk established its 3G network with a $211m foreign suppliers’ credit from Chinese EXIM Bank and taking equipment from Huawei.
It also used local fund of around Tk424 crore which was taken as arranged loans from banks.
Teletalk signed a contract with China Machinery Engineering Corporation on 27 December, 2010. The deal is effective from 6 January 2012. The government needs to repay the money in 20 years with an interest of 2% per annum, applicable after a 4-year grace period.
Teletalk first came with its 3G offer in October, 2012 under a commercial test run of the service while the private mobile phone operators were awarded 3G licences after an auction in September, 2013.
The state owned operator so far found 1.5 million 3G subscribers thought total market size crossed 12.5 million in the country.
