BTRC issues 2 NIX licences

Country`s telecom regulator -BTRC has issued two new licences in National Internet Exchange (NIX) category to bring down interruption in domestic internet traffic and save bandwidth.
Chairman of the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC) Sunil Kanti Bose handed over the licences to the Novocom Ltd and Bangladesh Internet Exchange Trust Wednesday.
As NIX licencees, the telecom firms will be responsible for management of internet bandwidth locally which will help internet activities remain within the country. Normally, if anyone sends email to his nearby people it reaches via Singapore because of using international bandwidth.
Industry insiders said this licence will facilitate local content development, web hosting and reduce latency in domestic traffic, thereby saving international bandwidth and foreign currency.
With the issuance of the licence, the activities done by the internet will come under a framework, they think.
Drafted in January by the BTRC, the telecom ministry approved the guideline of NIX in June, 2012.
Earlier, a high official of BTRC said the existing entities providing NIX services shall have to obtain licences, and simultaneously each of them will have to be certified by at least 10 licensed ISPs that they have peering connectivity with the applicants.
Licence acquisition fee has been fixed at Tk 10,000 and annual licence fee  Tk 5,000. The duration of the licence will be of 15 years.
According to the guideline, each licence holder will have to design network at least in one area of the districts of Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet, Khulna, Rajshahi, Barisal Gopalganj, Mymensingh, Comilla, Rangpur and Bogra within six months of issuing the licence.
Connectivity charge for the internet service providers to be connected with the NIX platform shall remain as per Service Level Agreement (SLA) with the prior approval of the commission and the commission may set interconnection charge for inter-IPTSP voice call, the guideline says.