VietNamNet Bridge – The government has issued a decision to allow the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC) to auction domain names and phone numbers.

MIC will determine the floor prices of auctioned domain names and phone numbers, which should be in accordance with existing laws.

The ministry will consult international practices on domain name and phone number auctioning, as well as prices.

Over 90,000 new .vn domains were activated last year, bringing the total number of national domain names to 263,900 and those with Vietnamese names to 127,166, according to the Viet Nam Internet Network Information Centre (VNNIC).

Viet Nam is number one in Southeast Asia for national domain registration and activation.

Last month, the government also approved a list of bandwidths to be auctioned in a bid to help mobile service providers expand their service coverage. The list includes three bandwidths: 2,300 MHz to 2,400 MHz, 2,500 MHz to 2,570 MHz and 2,620 MHz to 2,690 MHz. These bandwidths must meet the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 (IMT-2000) standard, as defined by the International Telecommunication Union, which includes GSM EDGE, UMTS and CDMA2000 as well as DECT and WiMAX.

Better known as 3G or 3rd Generation, the IMT standard is for services such as wide-area wireless voice telephone, video calls and wireless data, all in a mobile environment.

Thus, 3G networks enable operators to offer users a wider range of advanced services, while achieving greater network capacity through improved spectral efficiency.

After the auction, the duration of use of these bandwidths will be regulated by the Authority of Radio Frequency Management (ARFM) under the MIC.

In recent years, new mobile subscriptions in Viet Nam have skyrocketed, reaching 19 million in 2006, 25 million in 2007, 74 million in 2008 and 98 million in 2009. At the end of April, there were more than 134 million recorded subscribers.

VNS/VNN