Leading telcos striving for global reach Local telecom giants are stepping up efforts to seek for outbound investments to bolster business efficiency.   Among Vietnam’s telecom giants, military-run group Viettel was the trailblazer in outbound investment, pioneering in the area since 2006.  Viettel has spurred investments in nine foreign markets holding a cumulative 175 million potential customers. Out of these, six markets have become operational, including Cambodia, Laos, Mozambique, Haiti, East Timor and Peru, bringing $1.2 billion in revenue to Viettel in 2014.  In the three remaining markets (Cameroon, Burundi and Tanzania), Viettel has received operational licenses and is currently in the preparatory phase.  Most recently, Viettel Global has issued a resolution to make a foray into Myanmar, focusing on telecommunications and the company’s other core lines of business.  The total estimated investment capital of this project comes to about $1.8 billion, with $800 million coming from Viettel Global and the remaining $1 billion to be offset by its business partners in Myanmar and Viettel Myanmar.  Viettel has set forth the goal of acquiring 20-25 investment licenses to establish telecom networks abroad, providing service to 500-600 million people and carving a spot among the top 10 global telecommunications groups.  For its part, leading state-owned telco Vietnam Post and Telecommunications Group (VNPT) is seeking opportunities for outbound investments in markets such as Myanmar, Laos, and Cuba, according to VNPT’s general director Tran Manh Hung.  The group is penning a plan to form a Hong Kong-based joint stock company engaged in international investment and business in this market.   In fact, it has not been until now that VNPT made strides to reach the global market.  In 2008, the group had founded VNPT Global in a quest for seeking opportunities of outbound investment and had opened representative offices in the US, Singapore, Hong Kong and the Czech Republic.  However, after MobiFone- one of the two key members of VNPT, the other one being Vinaphone- was split from parent company VNPT in June 2014, the group has lost its section for international business affairs to MobiFone.  VNPT International (VNPT-I) has taken over the role of international management and has opened representative offices in Cambodia (July), in Myanmar (October) and Laos (December) last year.  The move serves to set a solid foothold for VNPT in these markets in the upcoming time.  Last year, VNPT-I raked in a fair revenue of an estimated VND3.13 trillion ($146 million) from international telephone services, internet broadband leasing and selling non-voice services in foreign markets such as Laos and Cambodia.  In a recent meeting on the implementation of development plans for 2015, Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Bac Son stressed the need for VNPT to consolidate its position in Vietnam’s telecom market as well as expand overseas investment.  In case of MobiFone, Vietnam’s second largest telecommunications services provider, in August 2012 a mission led by MobiFone chairman Le Ngoc Minh visited Myanmar to meet Burmese partners in the field.  The visit marked MobiFone’s first step in reaching out to foreign markets.  According to a MobiFone source, the company’s vision is to be ranked among the top 10 players in Asia, servicing about 200 million people in its foreign markets in the not too distant future. By Huu Tuan, VIR