Banglalink Digital Communications Ltd., d.b.a. Banglalink (; previously Orascom Telecom Bangladesh Ltd.) is a Bangladeshi telecommunications company headquartered in Dhaka. It's the third-largest mobile network operator in Bangladesh. Banglalink attained 1 million subscribers by December 2005, and 3 million subscribers by October 2006. In less than two years, by December 2007, Banglalink overtook Aktel (now Robi) to become the second-largest operator in Bangladesh with more than 7.1 million customers. Banglalink had 1.03 million connections until December 2005. The number of Banglalink users increased by 257% and stood at 3.64 million at the end of 2006, making it the fastest-growing operator in the world of that year. In August 2006, Banglalink became the first company to provide free incoming calls from BTTB for both postpaid and prepaid connections. On 20 August 2008, Banglalink got past the landmark of a 10 million subscriber base. As of August 2021, Banglalink has a subscriber base of 36.90 million. History Sheba Telecom (Pvt.) Ltd. was granted license in 1989 to operate in the rural areas of 199 upazilas. Later it obtained nationwide 15-year GSM license in November 1996 to extend its business to cellular mobile, radio telephone services. It launched operation in the last quarter of 1997 as a Bangladesh-Malaysia joint venture. In July 2004, it was reported that Egypt based Orascom Telecom is set to purchase the Malaysian stakes in Sheba Telecom through a hush-hush deal, as Sheba had failed to tap the business potentials in Bangladesh mainly due to a chronic feud between its Malaysian and Bangladeshi partners. An agreement was reached with Orascom worth US$25 million was finalized in secret. The pact has been kept secret for legal reasons, considering financial fallout and because of the feud. The main reason for the undercover dealing was the joint venture agreement between the Bangladeshi and the Malaysian partners, which dictates that if any party sells its Sheba shares, the other party will enjoy the first right to buy that. Integrated Services Ltd. (ISL), the Bangladeshi partner, was being 'officially' shown as purchasing the shares held by Technology Resources Industries (TRI) of Malaysia for $15 million. ISL then paid another $10 million to Standard Chartered Bank to settle Sheba's liabilities. In September 2004, Orascom Telecom Holdings purchased 100% of the shares of Sheba Telecom (Pvt.) Limited. It was acquired for US$60 million. Sheba had a base of 59,000 users, of whom 49,000 were regular when