Grameenphone

In September 2022, Grameenphone successfully conducted trials for the second time in Dhaka, Chittagong, Sylhet, Khulna, Rajshahi, Barisal, Mymensingh and Rangpur cities.

Founder Muhammad Yunus founded Grameenphone to provide universal mobile phone access throughout Bangladesh, including its rural areas.

After leaving his job as an investment banker in the United States, Quadir met and successfully raised money from New York-based investor and philanthropist Joshua Mailman.

He then returned to Bangladesh and worked for three years to gain support from organizations such as Grameen Bank and the Norwegian telecom company, Telenor.

Grameenphone introduced pre-paid mobile phone service in Bangladesh in September 1999 via an EDGE/GPRS/3G/4G enabled network.

GrameenPhone has E-SIM [21] With the help of Grameenphone, Grameen Telecom operates the national Village Phone program, alongside its own parent Grameen Bank and the International Finance Corporation (IFC), acting as the sole provider of telecommunications services to a number of rural areas.

Village Phone works as an owner-operated GSM payphone whereby a borrower takes a BDT 12,000 (US$200) loan from Grameen Bank to subscribe to Grameenphone and is then trained on how to operate it and how to charge others to use it at a profit.

[24][25] Community Information Center (CIC) or GPCIC was an initiative aimed at providing internet access and other communications services to rural areas.

In this project, Grameenphone provided GSM/EDGE/GPRS infrastructure and technical support and other partners Grameen Telecom Corporation and Society for Economic and Basic Advancement (SEBA), were involved in selecting and training entrepreneurs to run the village centers.

These CICs were used for a wide variety of business and personal purposes, from accessing health and agricultural information to using government services to video conferencing with relatives overseas.

A Grameenphone Centre (GPC) serves as a "one-stop solution" for customers, with all telecommunications products and services, under a single roof.

Typical Grameenphone 2G SIM Card
A GPC at Gulshan , Dhaka
A franchised Grameenphone centre at Tejgaon , Dhaka