Vietnam mobile service market growing more active
By Hien Nguyen - The Saigon Times Daily
|
| Visitors inspect a Nokia N97 on the sidelines of the conference in HCMC on Tuesday - Photo: Thu Hien |
HCMC – Strong movement is occurring in Vietnam’s mobile market which has seen handshakes and fierce races among mobile operators since the third generation network licenses were approved in April, heard the Nokia Convergence and Connection Era conference which opened in HCMC on Tuesday.
One of the strong movements is the cooperation between Nokia and MobiFone, which was announced on Tuesday.
Under the cooperation, MobiFone will supply unlimited data service to Nokia clients who buy Nokia N97. MobiFone 
provides GPRS service for 3 and 6 month terms for those who buy Nokia N97.
Mai Van Binh, deputy director of MobiFone, said at the conference on Tuesday that the cooperation with Nokia is an important strategy of MobiFone with an aim to offer the latest solutions and services to their mobile users based on the 3G platform.
“During the 3G deployment, MobiFone will continue to deepen their co-work with Nokia to deploy 3G service to clients,” Binh said.
According to telecom experts, MobiFone was wise to select Nokia as a key partner because Nokia accounts for 60% of the market share of mobile devices. Most of Nokia’s mobile devices are compatible with 3G infrastructure.
Deputy Minister of Information and Communication Tran Duc Lai said at the conference that the cooperation between mobile operator and mobile equipment supplier is a crucial factor which will determine the success of 3G.
“3G success depends on the price of mobile equipment,” Lai explained.
Lai noted that the quality of digital content, the price of devices and the price of 3G services are key elements which make 3G successful. Thus, 3G needs cooperation among mobile operators, equipment suppliers and digital content providers.
Last week, the local mobile market saw cooperation between EVT Telecom and Hanoi Telecom who operates the Vietnamobile network.
EVT Telecom and Hanoi Telecom announced that they invested VND6 trillion to construct 5,000 base transceiver stations nationwide to provide 3G service for their clients.
In March, EVN Telecom and Hanoi Telecom became the first local mobile providers to cooperate in sharing network infrastructure.
Along with the cooperation, the local mobile market has seen a fierce race of charge slashing among mobile operators. Viettel declared that they had been slashing mobile charges by as much as 30% since June 1.
Monthly charges for post paid subscribers have been reduced from VND59,000 to VND49,000. Meanwhile, calling charges for internal and external networks are down to VND100 per minute.
With price cuts, Viettel expects to add 30 million subscribers in the next two or three years.
To respond, MobiFone and Vinaphone under Vietnam Post and Communication Group reduced their mobile charges.
MobiFone has been offering monthly post subscriber fees at VND49,000 since June 3 and their calling charges are VND10 per minute lower than Viettel.
Vinaphone has cut their charges by 21% since June 5.
Meanwhile, major mobile operators are racing to cut their prices and making other operators concerned.
Ho Hong Son, managing director of the CDMA network S-Fone, told the Daily that in the situation of economic recession, mobile charge adjustment was a certain trend. However, strong price reductions put pressure on other operators who take a small piece of the market. Son was concerned that charge reductions would likely hurt small companies and market health.
“We recommended that the Ministry of Information and Communication consider the phenomena and map out a rational corridor for telecom fee reduction,” Son said.
Son explained that S-Fone could not live outside market regulations and would consider a new price policy which avoids loss for their clients.
Meanwhile, newcomer Vietnamobile showed their concern. Nguyen Xuan Quan, deputy director of Vietnamobile, said the company would consider revising its price policy although the mobile network was considered to have the lowest prices before June when it offered the basic VM One charge package for only VND26.67 for a one-second block.