Born in 1995, EVN Telecom has been taking a heavy loss after 16 years of operation. However, the small telco still seems to be valuable: though EVN Telecom has finally been taken over by Viettel, Hanoi Telecom has still unexpectedly asked for buying back EVN Telecom’s 3G waveband.
Born in 1995, EVN Telecom has been taking a heavy loss after 16 years of operation. However, the small telco still seems to be valuable: though EVN Telecom has finally been taken over by Viettel, Hanoi Telecom has still unexpectedly asked for buying back EVN Telecom’s 3G waveband.
Of all the operational mobile networks in Vietnam, EVN Telecom has been positioned nearly at the bottom of the ranking with the narrow wave coverage, mostly in big urban areas and some localities in the north, and with the limited number of subscribers, just hundreds of thousands.
Therefore, the death of the mobile network was anticipated five years ago, when three biggest telcos in the market, namely Viettel, VinaPhone and MobiFone applied a lot of measures to expand the market share and cement their firms positions in the market.
Viettel handed over
Feeling the nearing death, since 2008, EVN Telecom has been trying to negotiate with foreign and domestic partners on the development of the network. After refusing the two partners from Singapore and Malaysia, EVN Telecom sat down for the negotiations with FPT (the Corporation for Financing Technology), a big technology group which attempted to jump into the mobile network market.
However, the commercial affair between FPT and EVN Telecom failed, even though FPT paid a deposit of 708 billion dong. The deposit money, according to FPT’s General Director Truong Dinh Anh, would be paid back to FPT, because EVN Telecom has found the partner who buys back the telco.
After the Prime Minister released a notice on September 26, 2011, on transferring EVN Telecom to Viettel, on October 12, 2011, Viettel released a resolution on agreeing to take over EVN Telecom. A source from Viettel has affirmed that Viettel has well prepared in procedures and labor force to take over EVN Telecom, and that the transfer will be completed when the Prime Minister released the official decision on the transfer.
What does EVN Telecom have?
According to telecom experts, the most valuable assets of EVN Telecom include the five international connection portals in Quang Ninh, Lang Son, Tay Ninh, An Giang and Quang Tri, more than 40,000 km of fiber in 63 provinces and cities, the waveband of two networks CDMA 450 MHz and 3G, and the north-south backbone with the designed capacity of up to 400 Gbps.
An expert who asked to be not named, said that according to Japanese experts, the fiber system of EVN Telecom alone is valued at more than one billion dollars.
A question has been raised that what would be the “marriage portion” EVN Telecom would bring with itself when it “gets married” with Viettel.
Hoang Ngoc Diep, an independent consultant said that to date, no one can say for sure of the huge assets, which parts belong to EVN (the Electricity of Vietnam – the holding company of EVN Telecom) and which to EVN Telecom.
Diep has quoted his sources as saying that the international connection portals, the fiber system and the majority of BTS stations belong to EVN, not EVN Telecom, adding that the assets under the name of EVN Telecom prove to be modest.
“Meanwhile, CDMA 450MHz and 5MHz for 3G do not make much significance to Viettel,” he commented.
While Viettel is taking necessary steps to take over EVN Telecom, on October 18, 2011, Hanoi Telecom, the partner of EVN Telecom in building 3G network, sent a dispatch to the government and relevant ministries, asking to buy back the 3G waveband of EVN Telecom.
Explaining the decision, Hanoi Telecom said that the buying back will help reassure the foreign investor who now feels anxious when state owned telecom companies can now gather strength and competitiveness, which may block small enterprises and foreign invested enterprises.
Meanwhile, experts believe that a lot of unexpected things would occur in the EVN Telecom’s deal.
(Source: SGTT)
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Therefore, the death of the mobile network was anticipated five years ago, when three biggest telcos in the market, namely Viettel, VinaPhone and MobiFone applied a lot of measures to expand the market share and cement their firms positions in the market.
Viettel handed over
Feeling the nearing death, since 2008, EVN Telecom has been trying to negotiate with foreign and domestic partners on the development of the network. After refusing the two partners from Singapore and Malaysia, EVN Telecom sat down for the negotiations with FPT (the Corporation for Financing Technology), a big technology group which attempted to jump into the mobile network market.
However, the commercial affair between FPT and EVN Telecom failed, even though FPT paid a deposit of 708 billion dong. The deposit money, according to FPT’s General Director Truong Dinh Anh, would be paid back to FPT, because EVN Telecom has found the partner who buys back the telco.
After the Prime Minister released a notice on September 26, 2011, on transferring EVN Telecom to Viettel, on October 12, 2011, Viettel released a resolution on agreeing to take over EVN Telecom. A source from Viettel has affirmed that Viettel has well prepared in procedures and labor force to take over EVN Telecom, and that the transfer will be completed when the Prime Minister released the official decision on the transfer.
What does EVN Telecom have?
According to telecom experts, the most valuable assets of EVN Telecom include the five international connection portals in Quang Ninh, Lang Son, Tay Ninh, An Giang and Quang Tri, more than 40,000 km of fiber in 63 provinces and cities, the waveband of two networks CDMA 450 MHz and 3G, and the north-south backbone with the designed capacity of up to 400 Gbps.
An expert who asked to be not named, said that according to Japanese experts, the fiber system of EVN Telecom alone is valued at more than one billion dollars.
A question has been raised that what would be the “marriage portion” EVN Telecom would bring with itself when it “gets married” with Viettel.
Hoang Ngoc Diep, an independent consultant said that to date, no one can say for sure of the huge assets, which parts belong to EVN (the Electricity of Vietnam – the holding company of EVN Telecom) and which to EVN Telecom.
Diep has quoted his sources as saying that the international connection portals, the fiber system and the majority of BTS stations belong to EVN, not EVN Telecom, adding that the assets under the name of EVN Telecom prove to be modest.
“Meanwhile, CDMA 450MHz and 5MHz for 3G do not make much significance to Viettel,” he commented.
While Viettel is taking necessary steps to take over EVN Telecom, on October 18, 2011, Hanoi Telecom, the partner of EVN Telecom in building 3G network, sent a dispatch to the government and relevant ministries, asking to buy back the 3G waveband of EVN Telecom.
Explaining the decision, Hanoi Telecom said that the buying back will help reassure the foreign investor who now feels anxious when state owned telecom companies can now gather strength and competitiveness, which may block small enterprises and foreign invested enterprises.
Meanwhile, experts believe that a lot of unexpected things would occur in the EVN Telecom’s deal.
(Source: SGTT)
