FPT Retail's virtual mobile network will use MobiFone's infrastructure.

FPT Retail wants to provide services soon

Sharing with VietNamNet , a representative of FPT Retail said that this network operator will cooperate and use MobiFone's infrastructure to provide a virtual mobile network.

“FPT Corporation and MobiFone have a strategic cooperation agreement to enhance business efficiency, take advantage of the technological strengths of both sides, and contribute to promoting national digital transformation. FPT Retail will fully invest in hardware/software systems to ensure the best service to customers, aiming to build a digital ecosystem,” said a representative of FPT Retail.

Regarding service provision time, FPT Retail said that the time for a mobile network to prepare technical infrastructure takes an average of 12 - 15 months, but FPT Retail, with its technological advantages and support from FPT Corporation, expects to shorten this time and soon provide services to customers.

Every year, FPT Retail sells over 1.5 million smartphones and IoT devices of all kinds and is an agent providing mobile telecommunications services to hundreds of thousands of customers.

Up to now, the Ministry of Information and Communications has licensed 5 virtual mobile networks: Dong Duong Telecom, Mobicast, ASIM, Digilife and FPT Retail. Of which, the virtual mobile networks of Dong Duong Telecom and Mobicast use VinaPhone's infrastructure while ASIM, Digilife and FPT Retail use MobiFone's infrastructure. Only Viettel has not had any virtual network operator to cooperate with, even though Viettel is considered to have the strongest infrastructure at present.

New opportunities for virtual networks

In 2010, the Ministry of Information and Communications licensed a number of virtual mobile networks such as FPT and Digicom. However, at that time, the network operators only provided voice and 3G services, so virtual mobile networks could not compete with mobile networks with infrastructure.

Sharing with VietNamNet at that time, the leader of a large mobile network said that in a market like Vietnam, there is almost no room for virtual mobile networks. Perhaps virtual mobile networks can only survive when mobile networks with infrastructure have to sell traffic wholesale to virtual networks at a super cheap, uneconomical level.

At that time, when the “relationship” between EVN Telecom and VTC Digicom “broke down halfway”, EVN Telecom had to “change ownership” to Viettel, causing VTC’s path to enter the mobile network sector to become deadlocked. Mr. Nguyen Hoang Phong, Director of VTC Digicom, said that the attractiveness of investing in telecommunications was very low. The telecommunications market was too competitive. This competition made VTC no longer have the need to invest in it because it did not bring in profits.

After that, the dream of virtual mobile networks with FPT and VTC went up in smoke when they could not cooperate with network operators and provide services to the market. Therefore, the Ministry of Information and Communications had to revoke the licenses of these enterprises.

However, many businesses now see new opportunities for virtual mobile network services. Statistics at the end of 2022 show that there are up to 1,986 virtual mobile networks operating globally, more than double the number of traditional telecommunications network operators. The revenue of this market in the world in 2022 also reached an ideal figure of 78.15 billion USD and is expected to surpass the 124.81 billion USD mark in 2028.

Vietnamese businesses with large customer bases see the opportunity to build their own ecosystems. Among them, The Sherpa, a subsidiary of Masan, has acquired 70% of Mobicast shares, initially expanding into the telecommunications sector. This is a strategic step in the roadmap to realize the “Point of Life” platform that Masan outlined many years ago.

With a wide retail distribution system including Masan Consumer, Techcombank, VinCommerce and Phuc Long, serving nearly 15 million consumers who are knowledgeable and regularly use digital services, Masan needs a solution to integrate digital products and services into its consumer platform. Expanding into the telecommunications sector is the first step for Masan to digitize its “Point of Life” consumer ecosystem, providing an integrated product and service experience from offline to online. By combining with Reddi’s customer database, Masan will build a seamless integrated platform to bring value to consumers.

Like Masan, FPT Retail has many advantages when owning a nationwide retail network with more than 800 FPT Shop stores and nearly 1,300 Long Chau pharmacy stores. Each year, FPT Retail sells over 1.5 million smartphones and IoT devices of all kinds, and is also an agent providing mobile telecommunications services to hundreds of thousands of customers. In addition, FPT Retail has the advantage of exploiting FPT's diverse digital service ecosystem to develop its business.

However, the current policy issue for virtual mobile networks is a gap as they are still only “underdogs” compared to network operators with infrastructure. Therefore, network operators with infrastructure can set conditions for “playing” with virtual networks. These are issues raised for management agencies to create a healthy market development and competition.

FPT Retail unexpectedly "enters the battle" in the mobile market . Mr. Nguyen Thanh Phuc, Director of the Department of Telecommunications, said that the Ministry of Information and Communications has just granted FPT Retail a license to provide telecommunications services on the terrestrial mobile telecommunications network.

Source