DHAKA, Oct 11, 2018 (BSS) – International Business Machines (IBM)
Corporation, an American multinational information technology company, is
keen to set up a center of excellence aimed at boosting the country’s ICT
industry.
The assurance came during a meeting between Posts, telecommunications
and Information Technology Minister Mustafa Jabbar and Chief Digital Officer
of IBM India and South Asia Nipun Mehrotra at the ICT Tower at Agargaon in
the city today, an official release said.
Component Team leader of Leveraging ICT for Growth, Employment and
Governance (LICT) project Sami Ahmed and IBM officials were present at the
meeting.
At the meeting, the IBM has shown keen interest to work with the
government to set up a Center of Excellence (CoE) and build capacity of the
Bangladesh’s ICT industry.
They (IBM) are ready to work in the field of emerging technologies like
block chain, Artificial Intelligence (AI), Data Science and also in the areas
of agriculture, health and education.
LICT, a flagship project of Bangladesh Computer Council (BCC) of ICT
Division, took the initiative to set up a CoE on emerging technologies and
has already held series of meetings with the internationally reputed
companies in this regard.
Lauding the IBM’s willingness to cooperate in setting up a Center of
Excellence in Bangladesh, Jabbar said the government would be very happy to
work with the IBM, a pioneer in the field of information technology.
Digitization is progressing fast here and the government has already
created an ICT ecosystem on its journey towards Digital Bangladesh, the two
words were not in the Bangladesh’s lexicon even before the announcement of
Vision 2021 on 12 December 2008, he said.
Mustafa Jabbar said the entire country even the remote areas are being
brought under internet connectivity through establishing optical fiber cable
lines. “After launching 4G technology we have already completed test run of
5G,” he said.
During the meeting, the IBM which wind up their business here, is
planning to invest and set up its office again after evaluating Bangladesh’s
progress of digital transformation and considering the various global
researches that Bangladesh is one of the fast growing economies of the world.