Infrastructure sharing in telecommunications should be made mandatory to ensure better service on less investment in this sector, speakers said at a seminar in the city on Thursday.
They said mobile network operators' (MNOs) services are hampered due to non-compliance of tower sharing, which should be implemented immediately for quality service.
They were speaking at a roundtable on "Challenges in infrastructure sharing for the development of network" organised by the Telecom Reporters Network Bangladesh (TRNB) at Brac Centre Inn at Mohakhali.
Addressing the event as the chief guest, Telecommunication Minister Mustafa Jabbar urged the mobile network carriers to hand over their towers to tower companies so that all telecom firms can share the infrastructure and provide quality services to customers.
"Mobile phone operators should hand over the towers to tower companies. It will reduce the requirement for large investments in telecom companies," he added.
He said tower sharing should be 100 per cent and all four companies should be able to use them.
BTCL Managing Director (MD) Rafiqul Matin said policymakers should see how to serve the people through sharing without investing separately.
"If you come to the BTCL for sharing, you will get always a 'yes'," he added.
Hossain Sadat, CCO of Grameenphone noted that no agreement has been reached on tower sharing in the last four years.
"It is not fair to blame an operator for not sharing towers as agreement couldn't be reached," he said.
Managing Director (MD) of Teletalk Sahab Uddin said that the infrastructure and tower sharing will benefit small operators more.
"To increase the quality of service, tower sharing should be done," he said.
Robi's Executive Vice President (EVP) Anamika Bhakta also mentioned that operators could not share towers in the last four years.
Robi offered two operators but received feedback from one only," she said.
Managing Director (MD) of Fiber At Home Moinul Haque Siddiqui said, 100,000 towers will be required to serve the operators.
"Therefore the place of towers should be specified immediately," he added.
ISPAB president Imdadul Haque said that in terms of broadband, they have brought down 50 pop to 3 pop in Dhanmondi area with the example of network and infrastructure sharing.
"It reduces suffering and their entanglement," he said. BTRC Chairman Shyam Sunder Sikder, TRNB President Rased Mehedi and General Secretary Masuduzzaman Robin also spoke.
