Just days before the FIFA World Cup kicked off, Bangladeshi fans were unsure whether they would be able to watch the tournament at all. That uncertainty quickly gave way to a fierce battle for viewers, as three television channels and three OTT (over-the-top) platforms secured rights to broadcast every match of the tournament.
OTT platforms iScreen, Bioscope Plus and Toffee launched aggressive promotional campaigns ahead of the tournament, hoping to capitalise on the country’s football frenzy. Alongside their regular subscription plans, the platforms introduced special World Cup packages priced between Tk 97 and Tk 99.
However, on the opening night, many fans struggled to access the platforms. OTPs required for login either failed to arrive or expired before they could be entered, while even those who managed to log in were met with constant buffering. Complaints flooded social media as viewers reported interruptions every few seconds during the live broadcast.
According to sources familiar with the arrangement, all three OTT platforms received their broadcast feed from state-owned Bangladesh Television (BTV). While television broadcasters receive feeds directly via satellite, BTV had little prior experience distributing live feeds to multiple OTT platforms simultaneously.
BTV’s own website and app also experienced buffering issues on the opening night, and a source familiar with the matter said the broadcaster increased its bandwidth capacity following the disruptions.
The opening-night disruption has reignited questions about whether Bangladesh’s OTT platforms are adequately prepared for large-scale live events. While some services appear to have recovered quickly, the World Cup has exposed the challenges of delivering uninterrupted streaming to hundreds of thousands of viewers at once.
Industry insiders, however, believe the bigger problem lay with the OTT platforms’ infrastructure rather than the broadcast feed itself. With a large number of users attempting to log in and stream matches simultaneously, server capacity came under severe strain.
A senior official at one of the country’s leading network service providers, which works with telecom operators including Grameenphone and Banglalink, told Times of Bangladesh that the platforms may have underestimated demand.
“Toffee’s capacity is actually quite limited. If you have bandwidth designed to serve 500 users, can you realistically provide service to 5,000 users? Even BTV increased its bandwidth after the first day,” the official said.
The source noted that the OTP problem was a separate issue from server capacity and bandwidth.
“The OTP issue is a different matter. There is no way to accurately predict beforehand how much traffic or how many simultaneous users there will be at a given moment. So this really has no direct connection to OTT infrastructure itself,” the official said.
On the buffering issue, the source said platforms should have upgraded capacity in anticipation of an event as large as the World Cup.
“If bandwidth is insufficient, such disruptions can occur. It is similar to a website slowing down or crashing when it receives an unusually high volume of traffic at the same time,” the official added.
Banglalink, the parent company of Toffee, acknowledged the problems.
“We sincerely apologize to our customers and subscribers who experienced disruptions during the live streaming of the World Cup on Toffee. We understand the disappointment this caused and deeply regret the inconvenience,” Banglalink Head of Corporate Communications Gazi Towhid Ahmed said in a WhatsApp response to Times.
“Our teams are working closely with relevant stakeholders, including the World Cup feed rights holder and technical partners, to address the issues and strengthen platform performance. We thank our customers for their patience, continued support and trust,” he added.
Banglalink did not provide any specific explanation regarding server or bandwidth limitations.
Bioscope Plus, Grameenphone’s OTT platform, also blamed a technical glitch.
“Due to an unexpected technical glitch, some customers experienced difficulties while streaming the FIFA World Cup on Bioscope+. Our teams worked with utmost priority to restore normal service as quickly as possible. We apologize for the inconvenience and appreciate our customers’ patience and understanding,” said Sharfuddin Ahmed Chowdhury, Head of Communications at Grameenphone.
When asked specifically about the OTP failures and buffering complaints, Grameenphone’s Head of External Communications, Ankit Sureka, maintained that the issue stemmed from a technical glitch.
“It was a technical glitch. The problem was addressed from the very next match. Yesterday people watched it without disruption, including me,” he said.
Viewers largely confirmed improvements in subsequent broadcasts, with streaming quality improving significantly during the Brazil-Morocco match.
Mostafijour Rahman, a football enthusiast who experienced problems on the opening night, told Times that the issues appeared to have been resolved.
“The quality was HD and there was no buffering,” he said.
While Bioscope Plus appears to have expanded capacity following the initial disruption, industry sources say Toffee still faces infrastructure constraints.
An official at EDOTCO Bangladesh, which provides telecommunications tower services, said Toffee’s server capacity remains comparatively limited.
“Generally speaking, most operators already have some level of server infrastructure. Companies like Grameenphone and Robi, for example, have their own large-scale servers,” the official said on condition of anonymity.
“Toffee’s server capacity, however, is not particularly large. Given that they were going to stream an event as massive as the World Cup, the question is whether they should have invested in or arranged greater server capacity beforehand. From what I understand, they did not do that.”
The source added that traffic spikes were always likely during a major sporting event.
“The core issue was the surge in traffic. Every platform has servers, but capacities differ. They likely did not anticipate such a high number of users, causing the load to exceed server capacity and leading to crashes. Similar incidents have occurred even with platforms like Netflix and Amazon during unexpected traffic spikes.”
