Billions of Investments in ICT Sector in Iran

The Government expects an investment of $18.5b in ICT-sector over the next five years. In parallel the bandwidth is planned to be 4-folded.

The spread of third and fourth generation mobile internet access as well as 40 million smartphones across the country has caused the ministry of communications to consider the ever increasing potential for the development of electronic banking.

“Each cell phone can play the role of a bank card, therefore bank regulators must have a closer relationship with ICT departments,” said Mahmoud Vaezi, Minister of ICT, in the opening ceremony of the Sixth Annual Conference on Electronic Banking ans Payment Systems on 2 January 2017.

The Ministry of Communications reports that in the past three years, 120 trillion IRR ($3.7b) has been invested on ICT infrastructure, from which 80 trillion IRR ($2.5b) has come from the private sector whereas 40 trillion IRR (1.2b) has been invested by the Government.

In the sixth five-year development plan, starting from 21 March 2017, an additional 600 trillion IRR ($18.5b) has been expected to be invested in this sector, of which 200 trillion IRR is to come from the Government. Alongside this investment, the Government is planning for the investment of 500 trillion IRR in industries related to ICT.

Minister of ICT explained the expansion of access to the high-speed internet over the country: “Currently, around 700 towns and cities have access to 3rd generation and around 350 cities have access to 4th generation mobile internet access. We are planning to increase the countries bandwidth which is currently 4 Gb/s up to 17 Gb/s by the end of the year. Therefore we are ready to enter a new phase of change in many areas including banking.”

At the moment, many ministries are using the National Broadband Network. The Ministry of ICT has said that the development of the National Broadband Network has created more than 100 thousand jobs and therefore and the electronic Government is to begin by February 2017.