8.2 GRAMEEN PHONE (GP)

Grameen Phone (GP) is one of the four mobile telephone operators in Bangladesh. It is a joint venture company in which Telenor, the Norwegian State: 6 wend telecommunications company, owns 51 percent of the shares of GP; Grameen Telecom, a subsidiary of Grameen bank owns 35 percent; Marubeni corporation, one of Japan’s leading trading companies, owns 9.5 percent; while Gonofone Development corporation, a New York-based investment firm, owns the remaining 4.5 percent of the shares. Grameen Phone lunched its service on Independent Day on March 26, 1997.