VIETNAM, May 20 - HÀ NỘI — There will be four operators participating in the auction of 4G and 5G frequencies to get three frequency licences to provide 4G and 5G services.

A representative of the Việt Nam Telecommunications Authority (VNTA) under the Ministry of Information and Communications has confirmed that the four carriers are Viettel, VNPT, MobiFone and Vietnamobile.

These four carriers are eligible to participate in the auction to receive licences to provide telecommunications services.

After passing the review round of this profile, the carriers will officially participate in the auction to get three frequency licences to provide 4G and 5G services.

Band blocks A1 (2300 – 2330 Mhz), A2 (2330 – 2360 Mhz), A3 (2360 – 2390 Mhz) have a starting price of VNĐ5.8 trillion (US$245.75 million) and have a shelf life of 15 years.

Within 15 days after receiving the auction minutes, the Minister of Information and Communications shall issue a decision approving the auction results and publicly announce them on the portal of the ministry.

Thus, there will be only three carriers licensed for the 2300-2400 MHz frequency.

With Viettel, VNPT and MobiFone, they will need this band to improve service quality, especially 4G service.

In terms of the most necessary level, Vietnamobile is in dire need of new bands to provide services to customers, because they are currently the network operator with the fewest bandwidth resources.

Previously, the Ministry of Information and Communications has licensed telecommunications businesses to test 5G in 40 provinces and centrally-run cities.

The ministry encourages businesses to continue testing 5G applications, assessing market needs, and technical resources to build the most effective business plan when officially licensed.

According to international telecommunications equipment suppliers, 5G will be a digital infrastructure that will almost replace physical infrastructure in building future social connection platforms.

This digital infrastructure creates connections not only between people, but also between people and machines, and between machines and machines. Those are the bases that create automation as well as the transformation among industries.

However, international telecommunications experts said that, for Việt Nam, 4G was still important and would exist for a while.

Continuing to invest in 4G was also important, because in the next few years, 4G would still be the ubiquitous network, said experts.

But 5G will be deployed in hot spots, industrial zones, big cities and then can develop rapidly from 2025.

By 2030, 5G is expected to bring Vietnamese operators a revenue of $1.5 billion. — VNS