Startup & Tech

Why Your Shop's Trade Licence Now Depends on Showing a Bangla QR Code

Getting or renewing a trade licence in Bangladesh now comes with an extra step: showing you accept Bangla QR payments. The Local Government Division has instructed city corporations, municipalities and district administrations to make Bangla QR integration a condition of licensing, and this month it told them to start enforcing it in the field. The rule builds on a year of escalating central bank mandates, backed by fines up to Tk30 lakh and jail time for banks and payment providers that don't comply.

October 16, 2026Read more

Bangla QR Payments Go Free and Instant From Today as Bangladesh Bank Picks Up the Tab

Bangladesh Bank confirmed on September 30 that starting October 1, every Bangla QR merchant payment is credited instantly, with the minimum 1 percent merchant discount rate scrapped and the interchange fee set to zero, letting banks offer the service free or at nominal cost. The central bank will cover the gap with its own incentives of up to Tk2,000 per transaction, a bet on a network that has already grown 3.5 times in transaction volume over the past 90 days. Person-to-person transfers get the same instant treatment from November 1, and banks have until October 31 to fix several usability gaps in how customers access the service.

October 2, 2026Read more

Startup Funding in Bangladesh Falls to a Five Year Low as a New Tk400 Crore Government Fund Tries to Fill the Gap

Bangladesh's startups raised just $6 million in the first half of this year, a 95 percent collapse from the $120 million raised in the same months of 2025, even as global venture capital nearly doubled over the same stretch. The government's answer, a Tk400 crore Fund of Funds run through Startup Bangladesh Limited, began accepting expressions of interest from venture capital firms in August, aiming to route public money into the private funds startups actually deal with day to day. Founders and industry figures blame a familiar mix of dollar shortages, scattered regulation across multiple agencies and thin exit options, problems a single government fund is unlikely to solve on its own. Whether Tk400 crore can meaningfully offset a $114 million shortfall in private funding is the real question hanging over the program.

September 29, 2026Read more

Bangladesh Bank Clears Five Digital Banks to Start Building Toward Launch

Bangladesh Bank has issued letters of intent to five digital banks, including ventures backed by bKash, Robi Axiata and Banglalink parent VEON, choosing winners from 14 applicants in a licensing process that has dragged on for three years. The approval is only a conditional first step, not a final licence, and comes with a sharply higher capital requirement of Tk300 crore meant to keep undercapitalised players out. Regulators say the branchless banks are meant to serve small borrowers and underserved households rather than compete with conventional banks for corporate lending. Whether the model actually widens access to formal credit remains untested, with the real verdict still years away.

September 27, 2026Read more

Bangladesh Bank Orders Instant Settlement for Bangla QR Payments From October 1

Bangladesh Bank has ordered every bank, mobile financial service provider and payment operator to credit Bangla QR payments to a merchant's account the instant a transaction clears, starting October 1. The rule ends years of uneven settlement timelines that let small merchants get same day credit while bigger shops sometimes waited a full business day or more. It follows an August move that zeroed out merchant fees on small transactions, part of a broader push to make digital payments the default rather than the exception at Bangladeshi checkout counters. Providers also have until October 31 to redesign app home screens and open Bangla QR scanning to every account holder.

September 19, 2026Read more

Bangladesh Bank's New Udyog Scheme Offers Young Entrepreneurs Up to Tk20 Lakh, No Collateral Needed

Bangladesh Bank has opened nationwide applications for Udyog, a collateral free financing scheme that offers young entrepreneurs up to Tk20 lakh each, split evenly between a bank loan and an outright grant, to start or expand a business at the upazila level. Applicants must be 28 or younger, free of any loan default, and not already employed in the public sector, with selection panels judging business plans on feasibility and job creation potential. The scheme follows an initial pilot of around 640 entrepreneurs and arrives just as Bangladesh Bank grapples with record excess liquidity sitting idle in the banking system because lenders cannot find enough creditworthy borrowers.

September 14, 2026Read more

Bangladesh's Telecom Giants Bet on AI Subscriptions as Subscriber Base Shrinks

Grameenphone and Robi launched competing AI subscription bundles within a day of each other this month, offering access to ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and DeepSeek through a single mobile payment, as Bangladesh's telecom operators search for revenue beyond basic connectivity. The push comes as the country's internet subscriber base shrank by roughly seven million users in six months and global telecom revenue growth is projected at under 3 percent through 2028. By letting customers pay through mobile balance rather than a credit card, a payment method fewer than 2 percent of Bangladeshis have, the operators are betting AI access can become a genuinely new line of income rather than just another marketing push.

September 12, 2026Read more

Bangladesh's E-Waste Could Be Worth $200 Million a Year: Almost Nobody Is Recycling It

Bangladesh throws away roughly 3 million tonnes of electronic waste every year, and researchers say the recoverable metals inside it are worth 200 to 221 million US dollars annually. Less than a tenth of it is formally recycled, and government records show zero tonnes were collected by registered recyclers last fiscal year. For a handful of small waste-management startups already working the problem, that gap is either a crisis or the biggest opportunity nobody has claimed yet.

September 4, 2026Read more