Experts warn that there are not many potential clients any more for mobile service providers to attract in 2011. With 15-17 million subscribers expected to be developed in 2011, the seven mobile phone networks will have to target niche markets.

The words “niche markets” seem unfamiliar to the majority of Vietnamese people. However, niche markets are becoming the focus of mobile service providers, especially when there is not much room left in the general market to exploit.

“Niche markets” are defined as market segments, where service providers focus on a small number of clients who have specific demands.

On Valentines’ Day February 14, S-Fone launched a promotion for couples on mobile phones Combo Tinh Yeu (love) and Combo Hanh Phuc (happiness). both models can use two simcards at the same times and cost less than 700,000 dong. Besides, S-Fone also allows clients to make free calls to one registered S-Fone subscribers for six months.

The promotion began on February 10, 2011 and is scheduled to end on February 23.

Telecom experts have commented that the move is a part of S-Fone’s plan to focus on developing niche markets in 2011. In this case, the main clients are couples,

Developing niche market in 2011was to be expected, as the general market has become saturated. The number of mobile subscribers has reached about 150 million, nearly double the whole population.

In fact, S-Fone is not the pioneer in developing niche markets. Prior to that, VinaPhone and MobiFone, the two of the “big three”, and Vietnamobile have invested in niche markets.

In mid November 2010, MobiFone launched a promotion campaign for “little clients,” aged between five and nine, and senior clients. It seems that MobiFone is the first to offer a special program for children With just 790,000 dong, the children aged 5-9 will get a preferential network access kit Mobikid with pre-paid simcards and many other preferences for the next months.

The clients can choose between two kinds of mobile phones, either the one reserved for old people (S202) or children (Mobikid) and a pre-paid simcard with 590,000 dong. The clients will be given 16,500 dong a month (the sum of money will be added into the clients’ accounts) for the next 20 months. The subscribers can register four other MobiFone numbers in order to make calls at low charges of 640 dong per minute.

With Mobikid, in the first six months, clients can send 18 free inner-network messages a month. With the service package reserved for elderly people, they can increase the number of days of after activating simcards by 60 days. The call charges applied to the two service packages are 1480 dong per minute for the calls to other networks, and 1280 dong per minute for calls within the same network

Representative of the service provider said that elderly people and children have caught the provider’s attention because the demand from them is increasing.

MobiFone is offering the packages aimed at other groups of clients, such as M-Business M-Friendsand M-Home for family members.

Meanwhile, in an effort to attract young clients, teenagers or students, MobiFone has launched Q-Student and Q-Teen service packages and VinaPhone Talk Teen and Talk Student.

When talking about the business strategies for 2011, mobile service providers have announced that they will not focus on increasing the number of subscribers in 2011, but will pay attention to develop services and increase profit.

The fees have decreased to very low levels as the service providers have been slashing fees in order to attract more users.

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The Ministry of Information and Communications has called on Viet Nam Mobile Telecom Services Company (MobiFone) to speed up its equitisation.

Minister of Information and Communications Le Doan Hop told Vneconomy on Wednesday that the mandatory equitisation would improve the competitiveness of the telecoms industry and attract more foreign investment, thereby boosting the country's economy.

He said additional investment in the sector would boost technological advances and improve IT management.

The minister said equitising MobiFone was also part of the Government's core plan for 2011.

Hop said further meetings would be held this year to discuss MobiFone's equitisation.

Mobifone refused to comment when approached by Viet Nam News yesterday.

A report on Mobifone's business results in 2010, said the company's revenue reached VND36 trillion (US$1.7 billion), 35 per cent of the Post and Telecommunications Corporation of Viet Nam (VNPT)'s total revenue of VND5.8 trillion ($276 million) in pre-tax profit.

Mobifone was scheduled to equitise by the end of 2007 and hold its first initial public offering. It has now missed its equitisation deadline twice.

Source: VNS

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Distributors believe that the decision to devaluate the dong by 9.3 percent will not have a big influence on the prices of high-tech products in the first six months of 2011.

Exchange rate adjustment applauded

Ho Quoc Hue, Marketing Director of CMC Distribution, said that the exchange rate adjustment should be seen as good news for high-tech distributors. raising the interbank exchange rate to 20,693 dong per dollar has narrowed the gap with the black market. With the exchange rate adjustment, traders hope that the dollar’s value will be stable for a long term so theycan estimate their expenses and set up their business plans.

Sharing the same view, Huynh Nhan Quy, Market Research Director of Vien Thong (Telecom) A Company, said that the exchange rate adjustment is an indispensable move to narrow the gap between the official market and the black market. In fact, the dollar price has been high for a several months. Meanwhile, the official exchange rate was set at a level which was 10 percent lower than the actual rate, thus causing big difficulties to enterprises’ operation.

Unlike import companies, which complain that the more expensive dollar would make imports more expensive, Bach Khoa Computer’s General Director Tran Viet Quan believes that the exchange rate adjustment would not cause any difficulties to his company. Only a few products, mostly components, would see the prices increase. In fact, the prices of information technology products have increased twice in the past four months.

The exchange rate adjustment has been applauded by high-tech product importers, because they will be able to buy dollars more easily

Previously, high-tech product distributors could not buy dollars at the prices quoted by commercial banks, as they did not have enough dollars to satisfy the demand. Therefore, the distributors still had to buy dollars on the black marketrice levels.

High-tech products’ prices won’t increase immediately

Hue from CMC Distribution said that the Vietnam dong prices quoted by distributors at this moment have been set based on the black marketprice which is always higher than the official exchange rate. Therefore, the move to raise the official exchange rate to the level closer to the black market’s exchange rate, in the immediate time, will not have a big influence on the pricing of information technology products. He added that the prices would be stable at least in the first six months of the year.

Hoang Anh Tuan, Deputy General Director of Tran Anh Company, has also affirmed that to date, the prices of the products available at Tran Anh’s chain have not increased.

Huynh Nhan Quy from Vien Thong A also said that in principle, import products should become more expensive because of the weaker local currency, and the prices of laptop and mobile phones should increase. However, businessmen still have to consider other factors (the supply and demand, the stocks and suppliers’ distribution policies) to decide whether to raise prices.

“To date, we have not received any information from suppliers about the sale price adjustment. Therefore, the retail prices at Vien Thong A’s chain remain unchanged,” he said.

Meanwhile, Vo Thi Hoang Quan, Director of FPT Distribution said people would be more hesitant about purchasing information technology products.

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LAM DONG — The International Atomic Energy Agency has placed orders for six gamma computed tomography (CT) scanning equipment from the Centre for Applications of Nuclear Technology in Industry in Da Lat.

Nguyen Huu Quang, the director of the centre, said the Vienna, Austria-based IAEA placed the order after evaluating similar equipment made in South Korea, Malaysia, and Viet Nam.

The centre did the research, wrote the software, and manufactured the scanners using 100 per cent Vietnamese components, he added.

They use gamma rays to define the structure of objects and have application in detecting erosion and blockages in pipelines and determining the age of trees among others.

The Vietnamese scanners cost US$8,300 each.

The centre is run by the Viet Nam Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology.

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Vietnam is looking to launch in September an international initiative on sustainable management of land and forests, a senior official says.

The green economy initiative, which focuses on forest management, will be introduced in collaboration with the Netherlands, Deputy Head of Vietnamese Delegation to the United Nations, Bui The Giang, was quoted by the Vietnam News Agency as saying.

He said the initiative aims to boost dialogue and cooperation among policy makers, facilitate the development of small and medium-sized forest enterprises, and improve living conditions in rural areas.

Giang was attending the UN Forum on Forests in New York, an intergovernmental meeting dealing with forest-related issues that concluded on Friday.

He said the UN has just kicked off a year-long celebration to raise awareness of the value of forests around the world.

The UN on Wednesday declared 2011 as the International Year of Forests to promote conservation and sustainable development of all types of forests, which at least 1.6 billion people depend on for their livelihoods and subsistence needs.

Source: Thanh Nien

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The three largest mobile networks in Vietnam - Viettel, MobiFone and VinaPhone – said that the telecom market has become saturated. This year they will not concentrate on attracting new subscribers but develop services and increase the profit.

Viettel aims to have seven million new subscribers in 2011. According to this firm, the telecom market still has around 16 million potential subscribers and it expects to attract half of them.

However, it seems to be a difficult target so Viettel also sets the second target to raise its turnover and profit: developing new services.

An expert said that in the past the mobile network operators would reduce their prices to attract customers. However, telecom charges can’t be cut down any further this year because many input expenses have increased in 2010, including salary, accommodation, equipment, etc. As a result, the growth of the number of new subscribers will be lower.

VinaPhone and MobiFone aim to attract five million new subscribers this year and they will also focus on developing new services and improving their quality to raise their income and profit.

By the end of January 2011, Vietnam had over 157.6 million mobile subscribers, nearly double the number of the country’s population. However, less than 50 percent of them are active.

PV

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Vietnamese telecom giant Viettel has won a contract to become the fourth mobile network operator in Peru, news website VnExpress reported Monday.

The report said Viettel was selected over other bidders from Russia, Chile and Brazil as the Vietnamese firm pledged to provide free internet access to 4,025 schools in Peru, much more than the equirement of 1,350 schools.

Viettel plans to invest about $400 million in developing its network in Peru over ten years.

The new contract has made Peru the fifth foreign market which Viettel has invested in, after Cambodia, Laos, Haiti and Mozambique.

Peru, with a population of 30 million, previously had three mobile operators owned by Mexico's America Movil SAB, Spain's Telefonica and US-based NII Holdings Inc.

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Business Monitor International (BMI) forecasts that the Vietnamese information technology (IT) market is to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 12 percent over the 2011-2015 period.

In the freshly-issued "Vietnam Information Technology Report Q1 2011", the BMI, a leading, independent provider of proprietary data, analysis, ratings, rankings and forecasts, projected that the addressable domestic market for IT products and services is to reach US$3.3 billion by 2015.

According to the BMI, factors such as growing PC penetration, economic growth, a range of government ICT initiatives and ambitious plans to grow Vietnam's IT industry will help to underpin market progress.

The report wrote: "An ambitious government IT plan for 2010-2020 should shape many segments of the Vietnamese IT market, while Vietnam 's improving information and communication technology (ICT) infrastructure will also drive growth.

Vietnam 's gradual integration into global trade networks such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the World Trade Organisation (WTO) has helped to bring down prices and increase opportunities for importers."

It added that in November 2010, the government pledged to invest $8.5 billion over the next ten years in the ICT sector.

Meanwhile, the government's campaign to attract more foreign IT companies to invest in Vietnam received a boost with the announcement by American multinational company Hewlett-Packard (HP) that it would set up a wholly-owned firm in Vietnam in early 2011.

The government hopes to attract $5 billion of foreign investment into the IT industry by 2015.

According to the BMI, the Vietnamese PC market will be more competitive with multinational brands dominating the market, with HP the top-selling PC brand in 2009, ahead of Acer, and other multinational PC vendors including Dell, Toshiba and Asus having enjoyed strong recent growth in the booming market.

Meanwhile, Vietnam has around 10,000 firms currently licensed to provide IT services, but only one-third are actually operating. The Ministry of Communication and Informations is currently developing a draft decree on policies to help the IT industry grow.

Source: VNA

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Two mobile virtual network operators (MVNO) have yet to begin providing services on the market despite receiving licences to operate back in 2009.

Both VTC Telecom and Dong Duong Telecom planned to provide 3G services to mobile subscribers by hiring the networks of existing providers.

VTC Digicom earlier announced it would begin providing services in June 2010 under a co-operative agreement with Electricity of Viet Nam (EVN). VTC planned to hire the network of EVN Telecom to install over 5,000 3G-based transceiver stations (BTS) around the country, but the plan remained on the table.

Dong Duong Telecom was licensed in August of 2009 to supply services beginning in the first quarter of 2010, but the services were still pending.

Both companies have blamed the delays on difficulties in developing customer bases and marketing strategies to compete with other providers with existing telecommunications infrastructure. Some wondered whether major mobile service providers like Viettel, MobiFone and Vinaphone were even interested in sharing infrastructure facilities.

VTC Digicom director Nguyen Hoang Phong told Viet Nam News by phone: "VTC is exploring market segments and considering carefully the most suitable time to bring these services to the market."

According to the Ministry of Information and Communications, even a major telecom like military-run Viettel has signed up only 1.5 million 3G subscribers.

Source: VNS

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Hanel Limited Company has received an investment licence to build a software park in Ha Noi, worth a total of US$35 million.

The park will occupy 312,000sq.m in Phuc Loi Ward of Long Bien District and will be divided into zones for produce, electrical retail, IT training, a five-star hotel and a green park.

Nguyen Quoc Binh, Hanel's General Director, said the area would be the first technology park to meet international standards in Viet Nam.

It would be an advantageous environment for software enterprises to strongly invest in Viet Nam, Binh added.

Construction of the park will commence in the first quarter of this year and it is expected to be put into operation at the start of 2014. — VNS

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Enterprises were told that the implementation of the information technology (IT) and communication development should be their priority.

This is one of the requirements set in the draft plan for rapid transformation of Vietnam into an IT and communication power in the 2011-2015.

According to the plan, five key enterprises, including the Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Group VNPT, Viettel, VTC, FPT and CMC will have to, considering their conditions, implement concrete projects as parts of the plan. The objectives are to raise the investment in IT and communication to increase the proportion of its turnover in the total turnover of all industries; the expansion of the international market share; and the improvement the research capability.

Meanwhile, the five key enterprises say that they need detailed support mechanisms to successfully implement the above plan.

Nguyen Trung Chinh, General Director of CMC Company, says that CMC will prepare to act as the general contractor of Intranet services and national email service under normal mode or as PPP (public private partnership). Chinh affirms that if CMC is assigned the task, the services will be provided at 2000 points after the first 12 months of implementation, while the number of points would increase to 5000 after two years later.

Besides, Chinh also says that CMC can also undertake the project on providing one million low cost computers, the project on population database or the project on building key laboratories.

Nevertheless, Chinh says that CMC needs support to help it become a strong enterprise which can compete with regionally and internationally. The support that Chinh has mentioned is the capital support mechanism.

“The State needs to introduce policies to provide a strong support to IT and communication enterprises which undertake research and development activities, such as tax exemption, infrastructure support, and placing orders with enterprises,” Chinh says.

Sharing the same view, an executive of VNPT says that VNPT plans to spend 63 trillion dong to implement 12 projects. However, VNPT also needs a certain volume of “reciprocal capital” from the state budget,

For example, manufacturing smart terminal equipments, according to VNPT, will need some 10 billion dong. VNPT says it will spend 50 percent of the sum, while the state budget should cover the other 50 percent. Besides, VNPT has also suggested the 50-50 percent capital contribution for building test labs.

Meanwhile, Nguyen Truong Tung, President of FPT University, says FPT is ready to make the dream of turning Vietnam into an IT power become reality.

FPT University will produce at least 20 percent of the high quality workforce for the IT and communication sector. “However, we need preferential policies and support, especially in terms of financial,” Tung says.

The plan to transform Vietnam into an IT and communication power was approved by the Prime Minister on September 22, 2010. The main goals of the plan are to develop a qualified labor force for IT and communication; to make the IT sector, especially software industry, digital content and services the key sector with a high contribution to GDP growth and export.

During implementation period until 2020, the goal is for IT and communication to contribute 8-10 percent of the GDP. 80 percent of the IT major graduates will capable in terms of their professional and foreign language skills to join the international labor market.

It is expected that the total number of workers in the IT sector would reach one million.

Source: Dau tu

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