Vietnam tightens grip on mobile phone users

Vietnam’s Ministry of Information and Communications is drafting regulations that will ban the resale of registered sim cards, an official said.

 

The new rule is an attempt to restore order on the telecom market and make sure all mobile phone numbers, especially prepaid ones, are properly databased, Nguyen Xuan Tru, deputy director of the Telecommunications Department, was quoted as saying on the government's website.

Phone shops frequently recycle the personal information of one person to register multiple phone numbers.

Tru said the government plans to tighten control over these shops and ensure their customer databases are electronically linked to those maintained by the nation's mobile service providers.

Up to 90 percent of Vietnam's mobile phone customers are prepaid users. Until recently, many phone users went to shops and bought new numbers without bothering to register with the authorities.

In 2009, the governemnt ordered all prepaid subscribers to register their SIM cards or risk having their service suspended. After several deadline extensions, service providers reported that they had completed their customer databases in early 2010.

The Ministry of Information and Communications said it is working with the Ministry of Public Security to review the data collected by three major wireless networks, MobiFone, Vinaphone and Viettel.

Tru said the first inspection was launched in Hanoi on May 1 and is expected to wrap up by the end of June. After that, police will continue checking customer databases in Da Nang and Ho Chi Minh City, he said.

Phone users will be imformed if their numbers are found to have been improperly registered, Tru said. They will then have seven to 10 days to provide correct information before their numbers are deleted from the system, he added.

Source: Thanh Nien

The door opens narrowly for FPT to enter mobile service market

Analysts believe that the Corporation for Financing and Promoting Technology, or FPT does not have many opportunities to penetrate the telecom market.

 

FPT and the dream of entering mobile service market

After the “accident” with fixed line services, FPT still keeps ambitious to join the telecom market with mobile services. Sources said that in 2010, FPT tried to seek the permission to run a mobile virtual network (MVN) and provide satellite services. However, no further information has been released so far.

In late 2010, FPT, once again, showed its strong determination to enter the mobile service market with the announcement on purchasing stakes of EVN Telecom.

Nguyen Thanh Nam, former General Director of FPT, revealed that before deciding to purchase EVN Telecom’s stakes, FPT intended to buy S-Fone. Nam said FPT wants to “jump on the bandwagon” because it believes that the telecom market remains large which has room for FPT.

However, when FPT has a new general director – Truong Dinh Anh, it unilaterally announced the withdrawal from EVN Telecom because it has realized that this was not a good affair.

Nevertheless, FPT has never given up the plan to join the telecom market. Several days ago, FPT Chair, Truong Gia Binh confirmed the plan to “attack” the mobile service market. Binh believes that the most feasible solution for FPT is developing broadband telecom market based on LTE technology.

Not many opportunities for FPT

All the roads that can link FPT to the mobile service market prove to be tough.

FPT has got the license from the Ministry of Information and Communication on experimenting LTE technology. However, experts believe that the LTE technology will be commercialized in Vietnam no sooner than 2015. Service providers will have to go through a bid to be able to provide services, while this is really not the advantage of FPT.

Analysts believe that the mobile networks with the high numbers of 2G and 3G subscribers would have more advantages in implementing 4G. Therefore, they have every reason to doubt about the possibility of FPT obtaining a license for 4G. This means that FPT will have to think carefully about the investment efficiency, or it may fall into the “4G trap”.

At present, two mobile networks are still seeking investors, namely EVN Telecom and S-Fone. The two networks are thought to sell stakes only when they get good prices, because they are in big difficulties. However, FPT has shaken head to both networks.

In theory, FPT can think of purchasing Vietnamobile, the fourth biggest mobile network on the market. Everyone knows well that Hutchison, the current owner of Vietnamobile, is keen on making investments in mobile networks for reselling for profits. However, it is still unclear if FPT is financially capable enough to buy the network.

Another scenario has been drawn for FPT that it can cooperate with Hanoi Telecom to take full advantage of the company’s 3G license. However, if the 3G license is really the “chicken that lays golden eggs”, FPT will have to compete with many other rivals to become the partner of the company.

The most feasible scenario for FPT is to wait and hunt for purchasing MobiFone’s stakes as the big giant is going to be equitized. However, the equitization process has made no progress over the last five years.

Recently, the HCM City Stock Exchange released the list of classified enterprises, in which FPT appears in the sector of wholesaling and retailing. 
VietNamNet

Cash stifles Mobile Payment

Despite the great efforts by service providers, the payment via mobile phones (Mobile Payment) is still far from becoming popular in Vietnam, because Vietnamese people still prefer using cash in payment.

Bankers, telcoms launching services massively

 

In Vietnam, the concept of making payment via mobile phones was first heard when Asia Commercial Bank (ACB) allowed clients to use mobile phones to query bank account balances, transfer funds, pay cable TV, Internet bills. After that, a lot of other banks, including Vietcombank, Techcombank, BIDV and Vietinbank also provided many facilities to users.

Not only bankers, big telecom companies namely VinaPhone, Viettel and MobiFone, which have good telecom infrastructure, have also been trying to cooperate with bankers to develop applications.

Especially, online payment companies such as VinaPay, VnPay, PayNet have also launched a lot of services allowing to make payment via mobile phones, creating most favorable conditions for users to easily purchase mobile phone cards, game cards or online learning cards.

In late 2008, another concept - “e-wallet” was introduced. The appearance of VnMart, MoMo, Payoo, MobiVi developed by mobile service providers like VinaPhone, MobiFone and Viettel has helped Mobile Payment market become more bustling.

Mobile Payment “inferior” to cash payment

Experts and service providers believe that with the high mobile phone access level of Vietnamese people, Vietnam is a potential market for Mobile Payment services. However, to their surprise, Mobile Payment still has not become popular after eight years of development.

Jan Jirovec, Business Development Director of BSC Praha, which provides multi-channel banking solutions from Czech, who carried out research works on banking services in Vietnam, said that a lot of problems still can be seen in mobile payment in Vietnam.

“Vietnamese people still prefer using cash in making payment, while mobile phone users hesitate to learn about the facilities provided by enterprises,” he said, adding that Vietnam is still in the early development stage of mobile payment, which European countries once experienced more than 10 years ago.

Sharing the same view, banking experts have also said that the habit of using cash to avoid risks of Vietnamese people has hindered the development of mobile payment.

According to Duong Thu Huong, Secretary General of the Vietnam Banking Association VNBA, though ATM cards have become popular to Vietnamese people for the last 10 years, 83 percent of card holders say they only use cards for the only purpose – withdrawing cash from ATMs. Therefore, it is understandable why Mobile Payment remains unfamiliar and unfavorable to the majority of people.

However, Huong has also blamed commercial banks on the low popularity of modern payment facilities in Vietnam. “Many people want to use Mobile Payment, but they do not know where they should start,” she said. This means that bankers and service providers have not paid appropriate attention to launching media campaigns and giving basic introductions to users.

Meanwhile, some experts believe that Mobile Payment still cannot develop in Vietnam because Vietnamese clients still have doubts over the security of banking services.

Despite the difficulties, bankers still inject big money in developing Mobile Payment services, because they believe that “early birds can catch worms”. “Mobile payment will develop strongly in two or three years, and it is now the right time to make investment,” a banker said.
VietNamNet