bdapps becomes National App store

Dhaka, 04 March, 2021: State Minister for ICT Division Zunaid Ahmed Palak, MP has declared bdapps (www.bdapps.com), the country's largest mobile application platform, as the National Application store. The announcement was made today at the agreement signing ceremony between the Robi and ICT division at the later’s office.

The State Minister also said, from now on, app developers of other organizations and other mobile phone operators besides Robi will be able to upload their apps on this platform. The ICT division will work on income tax exemption for developers and the abolition of VAT on apps.

bdapps is the latgest mobile application platform in Bangladesh. Application developers can host their innovative applications in this platform and can sell it to the local mobile subscribers. This partnership aims to help the country's ICT innovation and entrepreneurship to develop faster.

ICT Division’s additional secretary Dr Bikarna Kumar Ghosh and Robi’s Managing Director and CEO, Mahtab Uddin Ahmed signed on the agreement on behalf of their respective organizations. The signing ceremony held at BCC Auditorium, ICT Tower. This arrangement is for five years with the option of extension.

Standing On the very brink fourth industrial revolution, very soon the job market is going to be transformed; the need for physical labor will be eliminated, giving rise to the demand for digital skillset. Both the organizations are keen to work together to formulate and modify developer- friendly policies and regulatory authorities to encourage entrepreneurship and digital skillsets in the local youth community.

ICT Division and Robi have already agreed to partner on a set of mandatory training for qualified incumbents having any programming language skill from ICTD’s pool. ICTD may include Robi in all its training programs and may get a revenue share for all its apps.

Speaking at the signing ceremony as the chief guest, Hon’ble State Minister for ICT Division, Zunaid Ahmed Palak said, "All of our initiatives and projects are focusing on youth, ICT and employment. This agreement will facilitate the developers’ training through ICTD’s current training facilities and monetizing their skills through bdapps. The Government is planning to work with bdapps to facilitate the dynamic youth of the country to engage in digital innovation and planning.

Acknowledging the tremendous progress made by, he said, bdapps will be a great stepping stone for the young generation and entrepreneurs to make a carrier as a developer from all across the country.

He also hoped that not only Robi, but customers from other operators can also connect with bdapps to ensure all Bangladeshi mobile users can enjoy the innovative applications from Bangladeshi developers.

Addressing the event, Robi’s Managing Director and CEO, Mahtab Uddin Ahmed said, “Working with the ICT division will boost up our dream to build a self-sustaining app industry for our young generation. This agreement will allow bdapps as the ICT Division’s endorsed hub for application developers and get access to ICT Division’s institutes, high-tech park, Digital Lab’s, and other resources to develop the youth people’s skill-set and thus to have a strong contribution in developing the Digital Bangladesh.”

He also said, to promote app development bdapps is bringing first of its kind wizard based Android app development solution for Bangladeshi developers to create a massive impact on all Android mobile phone users. We are also delighted to announce that, bdapps is launching a Seed Funding program for it’s developers to facilitate their initial marketing investments. We would request to our government to allow tax waivers for these amateur, young and qualified developers to accelerate these to a start-up and to create a nationwide wave for innovation centric economy.

Under the agreement, ICT will collaborate with bdapps to organize exclusive boot camps and events in government universities all across the country. The events will also enable bdapps to accelerate potential digital entrepreneurs and freelancers onboarding process through all the ICT Division’s labs in the country. ICT Division will also try to enable all Bangladeshi mobile users from all operators to enjoy these applications and bdapps will facilitate this vision through it’s state of the art technology.

ICTD and Robi will work together for development of new curriculum and training programs to encourage a new group of people to monetize their innovations through bdapps platform.

Robi will also support ICTD's programs with its available infrastructures and get easier access to all government-initiated digital centers and digital entrepreneurship incubation locations to utilize the facilities and promote digital education for young tech savvy entrepreneurs.

bdapps currently has over 12,000 developers and over 23,000 apps on its website. Female developers account for 20 percent of the number.In bdapps single developers are earning a maximum of 2 lakh taka per month and over 300 developers are earning Taka 30,000 revenue on every month. In last five years, bdapps have disbursed more than 55 Crore taka among the developers to build a self-sustaining generation in this digital era. Anyone (both Programmers and Non-Programmers) can create and publish an application by starting the journey through http://dev.bdapps.com/. For any challenge/assistance, developers can get 24 hours support (email to support@bdapps.com).

Ahmed Arman Siddiqui, Executive Vice President, Vas & New Business, Anamika Bhakta, Executive Vice President, Corporate Affairs and Media Communications, Sharif Shah Jamal Raj, Vice President, Public Affairs and other officials were also present on the occasion.