VietNamNet Bridge – On technology forums and Internet users’ forums, members have been forwarding the articles that guide how to cut the existing simcards to create the simcards fitting iPhone 5s.

iPhone 5s have been available in Vietnam for the last many days, but a lot of people still cannot use the super product because of no nano-sim. Telecom groups, the official distributors of iPhone 5, have promised to provide nano-sim, but Vietnamese people seem to run out of patience to wait for the products. They venture to have their simcards cut to create the new ones fitting the new products.

The salesmen at hi-tech shops specializing in providing Apple products said a lot of people have come to have their simcards cut.

The simcards most popularly used now have the size 25x15x0,76mm, or micro-sim (used for iPhone 4/4S, iPad) with the size 15x12x0,76mm. Meanwhile, people now want the simcards with the size 12,3x8,8x0,67mm.

The problem is that though all shops advertise that they have enough specialized instruments to cut simcards, none of them affirms that they would succeed in 100 percent of cases.

Mai Phu Phong, Director of PhonGee chain, also said his shops receive a lot of requests to cut simcards every day. However, the clients are always informed that the success probability percentage is low at 50 percent only.

Also according to Phong, failure has been reported for 100 percent of normal simcards, while only 50 percent of micro-sim can be turned into the nano-sim suitable to iPhone 5.

The administrator of a technology forum, which provides the articles, videos and images guiding the cutting of simcards, also admitted that people should anticipate risks when having simcards cut.

Phong admitted that though the cutting is carried out with machines, this would still much depend on people’s skills. Even those, who successfully cut simcards, are not sure if the self-modified simcards can be used for a long time.

Meanwhile, telecom groups have geared up to import nano-sim to Vietnam for domestic consumption. MobiFone is believed to be the first mobile network operator to provide nano-sim to Vietnamese.

Dinh Viet Hung, a senior executive of MobiFone, said the company would import 2000 nano-sims in two weeks to satisfy the domestic demand in the immediate time. After that, MobiFone would import 50,000 nano-sim more.

“We would sell nano-sim to Vietnamese iPhone 5 users at just 20,000 dong per product,” Hung affirmed.

VinaPhone has also stated that it would import nano-sim in October, while saying the retail price would be between 20,000 and 25,000 dong. Only Viettel has not released any information about the plan to provide nano-sim in Vietnam.

The start for new-generation simcards?

In June 2012, ETSI announced the new simcard standards, believed to be the fourth generation standards, under which, simcards are 40 percent smaller than micro-sim, similar to the current Apple’s nano-sim. ETSI said the smaller size would give manufacturers more space for arranging other parts of the phones.

Therefore, experts believe that the appearance of iPhone 5 which use nano-sim may be a starting point that kicks off a new era of using mobile phones with next-generation simcards.

In order to make nano-sim, users would have to cut down the length and the width of the simcards. The most important link of the chain is to abrade the simcards to make them as thinner as nano-sim. The most popular method used by Vietnamese people now is using abrasive paper. However, this method does not always bring success.

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