MAHMUDUL HASAN

Three local companies are spending about Tk 1,000 crore for the first private submarine cable that will connect Bangladesh with the outside world for data transmission.

Three private licensees of submarine cable -- Summit Communications, CdNet Communications and Metacore Subcom Ltd -- have formed a consortium to install the cable, which will have the capacity to supply 45,000Gbps bandwidth.

The development is set to disrupt the monopoly held by the state-controlled wholesale bandwidth provider, Bangladesh Submarine Cables PLC (BSCPLC), and is expected to lower internet prices by increasing the supply of bandwidth.

“We, the three companies together, have already entered into an agreement with Singapore-based Campana,” Mashiur Rahman, CEO of CdNet Communications, told The Daily Star.

The 3,000km undersea cable, originating from Singapore, will connect to Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar. The fibre laying process will be conducted in two phases, he added.

Campana will provide a connection to the Sigmar cable, a 1900-km long cable system connecting Singapore and Myanmar. The three companies will pay about $35 million and will get indefensible rights of use for 25 years.

For the second phase, the local consortium is finalising a deal with submarine cable provider HMN to lay fibre from Cox’s Bazar to Myanmar. For that, the three companies have to spend about $45 million.

“The contract with HMN will be signed in December this year,” said Rahman.

The cable will have three fibre pairs and will have a data transmission capacity of about 15,000Gbps through each pair.

The cable will connect Bangladesh with Telin-3, a data centre located at Tanjong Kling in Singapore.

Currently, total bandwidth usage stands at about 5,000Gbps and more than half of it -- about 2,700Gbps -- comes through international terrestrial cable (ITC) licences, which are used to import bandwidth from India across land.

The rest -- about 2,300Gbps -- is supplied by the BSCPLC, which connects the country with two submarine cables.

Bangladesh is a member of the South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 4 (SEA-ME-WE 4) consortium, the first undersea cable with which Bangladesh was connected in 2006. It supplies about 800Gbps bandwidth.