VietNamNet Bridge – Though many Vietnamese mobile phone brands have been available on the market only for the last few years, they have still been able to cement a firm position on the market. Especially, they have become the redoubtable rivals to the giant Nokia.

2010 was the year which witnessed the appearance of a series of Vietnamese mobile phone brands, such as Q-Mobile, F-mobile. Just several years ago, people could not imagine that Vietnamese mobile phone brands could exist on the market one day. However, the success of many Vietnamese brands recently has made people change their minds. Vietnamese mobile phones have been selling well thanks to their reasonable prices

Experts said that in 2010, the giant Nokia lost its market share into the hands of Q-Mobile, a 100 percent Vietnamese brand. Q-Mobile products now account for 20 percent of the total number of mobile phones sold in the domestic market, while it ranks the second in terms of the domestic mobile phone market share.

Jumping into the mobile phone market in mid 2008, ABTel, the owner of Q-Mobile brand, is now considered the most successful enterprise in the market of Vietnamese brands.

Especially, Q-Mobile hopes it can surpass Nokia to become the leading brand in Vietnam’s mobile market one day.

Q-Mobile’s products are dominating the market for low income earners (the products are priced between 600,000 dong and two million dong).

However, while many experts happily talk about the appearance of purely Vietnamese mobile phone brands, other experts have pointed out that Vietnam has never had “made-in Vietnam mobile phone products”. The problem is that though the mobile phones bear Vietnamese brands, they are made in China, not in Vietnam.

Nguyen Quang Tung, a senior executive of An Binh Telecom also admitted that his enterprise does not manufacture Q-Mobile brand phones in Vietnam, but it outsources its production to China. Tung said that China is considered the factory of the world. Meanwhile, it is clear that Vietnam, with its underdeveloped supporting industries, cannot manufacture mobile phones.

Arguments have been raised about whether such mobile phone brands are considered Vietnamese brands. The arguments have not come to an end yet. However, experts believe that it is still a good thing that Vietnamese enterprises have been trying to make every effort to develop Vietnamese brands

Representative of a Vietnamese mobile brand frankly said: “What we are striving is that Vietnamese brand mobile phones become so cheap that even the taxi motorbike driver can also have mobile phones”.

“If iPhones are favourite on the market thanks to the applications on Apple Store, and Nokia has Ovi Store, Vietnamese mobile phone brands will have the big advantages including their prices fit the pockets of many people and they have many applications, which allow people to play games or read newspapers online.

According to VnMedia, the boom of Vietnamese mobile phone brands, which began in 2010, will be the growing tendency of the information and communication market in 2011.