For the first time in a quarterly (January-March) report, Grameenphone's(GP) number of Internet users has declined. Although the number of effective internet users has decreased a bit, their income from internet or digital services has increased.
According to a recently released first quarter report of GP, in the first three months of the year, their internet subscribers decreased by two lakh but their revenue increased by Taka 50 crore. In the first quarter of the year, they have earned a total income of exactly Taka eight hundred and fifty crore rupees from the data. Even in the last quarter of last year, it was Taka 800 crore.
At the end of March, the country's largest subscriber operator had four crore four lakh internet connections. But at the beginning of the year, the number of their internet subscribers is four crore and six lakh.
At the end of March last year, however, they had an effective Internet connection of 3 crore 82 lakh. And then the income from data was Taka 690 crore. So it turns out that although the number of Internet users is pretty much the same, their income from this sector is growing by leaps and bounds.
According to a source in the operator, although the number of internet users is the same as before, they have been able to bring more 3G or 2G subscribers to 4G instead of capturing new subscribers. As a result, as their overall data usage has increased, so has their income from this sector.
Grameenphone said the reason for their position is their strong network. The operator now has 1.42 crore 4G subscribers. That is why the overall data usage has increased.
Grameenphone is now using 2,225 MB of data per month for every effective internet connection which was only 1,418 MB at the same time last year. Moreover, their 4G network covers three-fourth of the country's population. And with the total mobile network, 96 percent of the country's area where 99.60 percent people actually live.