CLOUD 360

be alive with cloud

VAS Content and Service Provider in Bangladesh

Shariful Islam
Version 01

Date: March26, 2016

cloud360bd@gmail.com

CONTENTS

Introduction

Content and Service Provider

Regulatory

Present and Future VAS

Value Chain & Facts

Challenges & Conclusion

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Bangladesh at Glance
Bangladesh is Located in South Asia.

Demography
Population: 152M
Male : 51%
Female : 49%
Literacy Rate: 60%

Information Technology (IT)

Country Domain: .bd
Internet Penetration: 5 crores (30% of population)
Mobile Users: 121M
Mobile Penetration: 80% of the population

Economy
Recognitions: Bangladesh is one of the members of the Developing 8 and considered as
the Next Eleven Economy of the world in 20 coined by Goldman Sachs.
GDP: $1,314 (per capita in 2015)
GDP Growth Rate (%): 6.12 (2013-2014)
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VAS and Bangladesh Mobile Market

VAS is a commonly used acronym for Value Added Service which is a popular term in telecommunications
sector to offer services to customers beyond the core services like SMS, voice and data. It can bring
additional income to operator, retain the Existing subs. as well as its bring more values.
Example: RBT, IVR, MTV, News etc

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Content Provider
Content Provider: The content provider only provides different types of contents to the service
Providers. Example: Music, News, logo etc
Who are they: G Series, Impress telefilm, Channel I, Prothom-alo etc

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Service Provider
Service Provider: Service Provider providing Services in two ways1. Giving service to end user directly.
2. Give contents to Operator only.

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Service Provider
B2M is a joint venture company with Zingmobile Group, Singapore and Axiom Technologies
Limited, Bangladesh.
IVR, RBT
Wintel
Limited

4000, 8466

Daily News, Breaking 2777

News, Cricket Live
Update, Cricket Alert,
Sports Update etc
WAP, USSD,
Recharge, App etc

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Service Provider
B2M is a joint venture company with Zingmobile Group, Singapore and Axiom Technologies
Limited, Bangladesh.

B2M
Technologies

Interactive Voice
Response (IVR),

5656

Short Messaging
System (SMS)

5353

Wireless Application
Protocol (WAP)

http://b2
mwap.co
m
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How to get Short Code

To getting the short code you have to apply BTRC. That time, it requires to submit
Following documents:

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Short Code Category-Allocation and Yearly Fees

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Present VAS Services

Information

Entertainment

Video

MFS

Others

Contents

News, Horoscope,
Weather etc.

Local songs, Hindi, English

songs etc.

Mobile TV, Cricket, Small

clip etc

Mobile banking
etc

Games,
lottery etc

Channels

SMS, IVR, Wap etc

IVR, RBT etc

Application, Vod

SMS and uSSD

Applicatio
n

Popularity

***

****

**

*****

Model

CAPEX & Revenue

Share most cases

Revenue Share most cases

Revenue Share most

cases

CAPEX

CAPEX

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Future Digital VAS which can attract

IPTV and OTT TV

LBS

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M2M/IoT

Intelligent Application

Digital Advertisement

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Future Digital VAS which can attract

RCS

Digital Music

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Digital Lottery

Smart Health

Surveillance

Online Game

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Value Chain and Revenue Sharing Mode in Bangladesh

Market

Content
Owners

Content
Aggregator

5-10%

2-3%

VAS Enabler

15-25%

Mobile
Operators

55-65%

NB: Depends on the agreement the percentage may vary and for future vas it might be changed.
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The Facts
There is no guideline for the CP/SP. They are independent. After taking short code
from BTRC and negotiation with Mobile network operators they can run this business.
MNOs are dominating this market as they have large subscribers.
MNOs mainly make the policies and do the agreement with CP/SP.
By implementing Big Data concept, MNO can offer different packages to
define customers.
At present MNO directly contact with the Content owner and sourcing the contents.

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Connectivity with Mobile Network Operator-MNO

Connectivity with SDP

CP/SP required to connect with MNOs SDP instead of
service enablers(e.g. SMSC, LBS, MMSC, USSD etc). SDP
will provide single point of module for all VAS Providers.

Subscription & Charging

Subscription& Charging logic will be in SDP side. SDP will
manage whole lifecycle. VAS provide only provide
content & service only.
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Challenges
No Standard
regulations
for the
CP/SP
MNO
dominating
the market

Smart Phone
Penetration
is less

Challenges
Biased on
Revenue
Sharing
mode

Many
more.

Customer
are not
aware of the
VAS

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Recommendation
MNO and VAS provider should design the service in such a way that end user understand
the service in its features.
Auto activation and hidden costs act as the deterrent for the customers to subscribe
so the company should try and minimize such annoying factors
Operator needs to do intelligent campaigning.
Using the Big Data concept to send promotional message to right people in right time.
Online ads, Newspapers & Billboards should be made more effective for promoting
value added services.
Provide Unified Application which can cater customize services.
Need offer Branded & Reliable contents.

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Conclusion
Bangladesh is potential market the operator, vendor and CP/SP. Day by day its subscriber
added tremendously. Recent few years CP/SP introduce new and innovative services to its
mobile subscribers in a win-win situation, whereby both the operator and the end user get
benefited. In recent years operator experienced tremendous growth in its subscriber base
and is expecting even more in the years to come. To cater large number of subscribers new
technologies are being introduced to transport and connectivity of such services.

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Abbreviations & Bibliography

VAS: Value Added Service
CP: Content Provider
SP: Service Provider
MNO: Mobile Network Operator
MFS: Mobile Financial Service
SMS: Short Message Service
MMS: Mobile Multimedia Service
SDP: Service Delivery Platform
OCS: Online Charging System
LBS: Location Based Service
M2M: Machine to Machine
IoT: Internet of Things
OTT: Over the Top
IPTV: IP Television
RCS: Rich Communication Suite
BTRC: Bangladesh Telecom Regulatory Commission

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www.btrc.gov.bd
www.google.com
www.cloud360bd.com
www.vas-invention.com
www.bangladesh.gov.bd
www.flickr.com

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About the author

Shariful Islam is the founder and owner of Cloud 360. He has 8+ years
ICT experience. He has been working in a multinational telecom company.
He is constantly looking for new ways to server the backward community
both online and offline.
He can be contacted at cloud360bd@gmail.com

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