Vietnamese Operator Confirms CDMA to GSM Migration

Vietnamese CDMA operator, HT Mobile says that it has been granted permission from the Ministry of Information and Communications to migrate its network over to the GSM platform. The company expects to retain use of its existing 800Mhz spectrum and reuse up to 80% of its old equipment.

Reports last week suggested that the operator was considering the move.

Trinh Minh Chau, General Director of HT Mobile told the VietNamNet Bridge that the change will not negatively affect HT Mobile subscribers and all customers would receive a free replacement GSM handset when the migration is ready.

Chau also said they will support any subscriber who wants to stop using HT MobileĆ's service and subscribe to another network. There had also been related reports that S-Fone is already in talks to try and purchase the discontinued CDMA network infrastructure.

HT Mobile was established in 2003 as a CDMA2000 joint venture between Hutchison Telecom and Hanoi Telecom.

According to figures from the Mobile World, HT Mobile launched its services early last year but had only secured around 185,000 customers by the end of September. The country has 34 million phone subscribers, of which nearly 28 million are connected to other operator GSM networks, and remainder are on CDMA networks, S-Fone (3.7 million) and VP Telecom (2.5 million)

On the web: VietNamNet Bridge - Mobile World

Posted to the site on 17th January 2008