The Pharmacy Council of Bangladesh (PCB), an autonomous body under the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, plays a pivotal role in regulating pharmacy education and professional practice across the country. Established under the Pharmacy Act 2013 (formerly the Pharmacy Ordinance 1976), PCB is responsible for accrediting institutions, approving curricula and training standards, conducting examinations, and issuing registration certificates to pharmacists (Grades A, B, and C). With its commitment to maintaining excellence in pharmaceutical services across academia, industry, and healthcare settings, PCB ensures that pharmacy practice in Bangladesh meets national and global standards.
As the demand for registered pharmacy professionals continued to rise, PCB recognized the limitations of its manual C-Category registration process. On 12 May 2025, PCB marked a significant digital transformation milestone by implementing a fully automated system to support a scalable, transparent, and efficient registration process nationwide.
To realize this vision, PCB partnered with JBRSOFT Limited, a leading technology firm specializing in mission-critical digital systems. Together, they developed and deployed a comprehensive online platform that automates end-to-end processes—including pharmacist registration, renewals, institute accreditation, payment integration, digital certificate issuance, and real-time status tracking—ensuring a seamless experience for users and administrators alike.
This transformation journey began in 2019, when the USAID-funded Better Health in Bangladesh project, implemented by Management Sciences for Health (MSH), collaborated with PCB and provided financial support for the system’s initial development. JBRSOFT served as the technical partner throughout, and in 2022, PCB officially took over the project, continuing to advance the system in partnership with JBRSOFT through a direct contractual arrangement.
This article shares insights from the latest milestone—successfully managing over 17,200 pharmacist registrations for the 64th Batch in 12 hours through the PCB Automation System—highlighting how digital innovation can effectively solve public sector bottlenecks and enable large-scale, efficient service delivery in healthcare.
The Purpose Behind PCB's Digital Initiative
The PCB launched the C-Category online registration system with the strategic goal of digitizing and streamlining the registration process for pharmacy professionals across Bangladesh. This initiative was designed to replace traditional manual workflows with a centralized, automated platform—enhancing operational efficiency, ensuring data accuracy, and reducing the time and effort required from both applicants and administrators.
By leveraging technology, PCB aimed to improve transparency, minimize processing delays, and make the registration process more accessible to applicants nationwide. The platform was specifically built to support secure data handling, real-time status tracking, and user-friendly interactions—aligning with the government’s broader vision for digital governance and public service modernization.
The Challenge
When the registration process officially commenced on May 4, 2025, PCB encountered a series of unforeseen challenges that disrupted the smooth operation of the online platform. Despite thorough preparation, the overwhelming volume of traffic caused significant performance issues. The registration portal, designed to handle a high number of concurrent users, struggled to cope with the surge of traffic, resulting in slow loading times, server timeouts, and in some cases, complete system crashes.
As users across Bangladesh attempted to access the portal, they faced long wait times and error messages, leading to frustration and uncertainty. Social media channels were quickly flooded with complaints from applicants, many of whom were unable to complete their registrations or access necessary information. This heightened the urgency for immediate intervention, as the credibility of the platform and the registration process itself was at stake.
These challenges not only tested the platform's scalability but also posed a risk to the overall success of the project, requiring a rapid and effective solution to restore functionality and public trust in the system.
A 9-Day Journey to Success
In response to the challenges that emerged during the early days of the registration process, JBRSOFT Limited acted swiftly and strategically to stabilize the system and restore confidence among users. Within the first 24 hours of the initial system downtime, JBRSOFT’s engineering and technical teams conducted a comprehensive analysis to pinpoint the root causes. It became evident that the platform infrastructure required immediate scaling to accommodate the unexpectedly high volume of concurrent users.
Over the following eight days, JBRSOFT implemented a series of critical improvements. These included expanding server capacity, transferring from Bangladesh Computer Council to AWS, optimizing load balancing, improving application logic, query optimization and fine-tuning the database to enhance performance. Advanced monitoring tools were also deployed to enable real-time issue detection and rapid response. Throughout this period, JBRSOFT maintained close coordination with PCB to ensure timely communication with users and manage expectations transparently.
On May 12, 2025, as the registration process resumed, the system experienced another sudden spike in load. Just two minutes after launch, server issues briefly reappeared, disrupting access for users. Yet, JBRSOFT’s experienced team remained calm and focused, quickly identifying and resolving the issue within 30 minutes. The platform was promptly restored, and applicants were able to resume their registrations without further interruption.
By the end of May 13, the system had achieved full stability, enabling the successful completion of 17,200 registrations. JBRSOFT’s ability to rapidly scale infrastructure, resolve technical challenges, and maintain open communication with all stakeholders was instrumental in the project’s success. The team’s professionalism, agility, and commitment ensured a seamless experience for thousands of pharmacy professionals across the country.
End-User Complaint Management
To ensure responsive and transparent communication during the registration process, JBRSOFT Limited established two open live chatbot channels—jbrsoft.com/support and pcbapps.com.bd/support. These platforms allowed applicants to report issues in real time. A dedicated team of six support engineers actively responded to queries, resolved common issues, and opened support tickets for more complex cases requiring further investigation.
This system enabled us to listen closely to applicants’ feedback, expectations, frustrations, and complaints—particularly during periods of downtime or registration errors. Our team continues to address these issues individually through email, SMS, and phone calls where needed.
We sincerely apologize to those applicants who were unable to complete registration and understand the inconvenience caused. We encourage them to apply for the next batch and assure that lessons learned from this experience will help us improve system performance and user experience for future high-volume enrollments.
Gratitude to PCB
JBRSOFT Limited extends its sincere appreciation to the Pharmacy Council of Bangladesh (PCB) team for their unwavering support, patience, and trust throughout this challenging period. We are especially grateful to Muhammad Mahbubul Haq, Secretary Md. Asif Hassan, Deputy Director (Admin) Mst. Tanjina Afrin, Assistant Accounts Officer Nayem Ahmed, IT Officer, and all other team members whose dedication and collaboration were instrumental in overcoming the obstacles faced. Their confidence in our capabilities and strong spirit of partnership played a pivotal role in the successful execution of the registration process.
Conclusion
The success of the C-Category registration system marks a significant step in Bangladesh’s digital public service journey. Through close collaboration between PCB and JBRSOFT Limited, over 17K applicants registered seamlessly—despite early challenges. This achievement reflects the power of agile technology, strong partnerships, and a shared commitment to innovation in delivering impactful digital solutions. We extend our sincere gratitude to our dedicated team—Raton Kumar Halder, Razidul Islam, Tabarul Islam, Omar Ibn Kamal, Fatema Banu, Abul Hasnat—and to our visionary CEO at JBRSOFT, as well as our trusted AWS advisor, Mr. Mithun Zakir, for their invaluable contributions.
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