Mytel, Viettel’s mobile operator in Myanmar, has signed with more than one million subscribers in just 10 days since it officially began operations.

This is not only the fastest customer growth rate among Viettel Group’s markets, but a rare performance that few telecom services providers in the world could reproduce.

Setting up the most extensive telecom infrastructure in Myanmar even before starting operations is one of the reasons behind Viettel’s achievement.

It has laid 30,000-kilometre of fibre-optic cable, or 50 per cent of the country’s total cable infrastructure, covering 80 per cent of the population.

It is the only mobile network to provide 4G services nationwide, covering 300 out of 330 towns, while the second biggest competitor only covers 185. Mytel has set up a nationwide distribution system with 50 stores and 50,000 sales agents, 70 per cent of whom are in rural and remote areas.

The company also offers very attractive promotions to mark its inauguration.

Notably, for 4,000 Myanmarese Kyat ($3), subscribers receive 5GB and 250 minutes of calling within the Mytel network for 30 days—much higher than other networks offer. Subscribers also get 100 per cent bonus on top-up value every day, instead of other network’s 33-50 per cent bonus.

Nguyen Thanh Nam, Mytel’s general director, said that while Myanmar has experienced rapid economic growth, mobile phone penetration in the country has remained low, creating huge opportunities for the telecom sector, especially Viettel.

"We set the target of two to three million customers in Myanmar in 2018,” he said.

viettel signs with one million subscribers in myanmar in first 10 days

Previously on June 9, Viettel Group officially launched the 10th international mobile network in Myanmar with the Mytel brand, becoming the first network operator in Myanmar.

Myanmar is Viettel’s most promising market, with the highest economic growth rate at 7 per cent last year. It also has high growth in the telecommunications and IT sector.

Besides, it is also a very competitive market. Notably, telecom services are already used by 90 per cent of the population, calling and data tariffs are cheap, and there is fierce competition from international networks like Norway’s Telenor, the world’s 13th biggest, and Qatar’s Ooredoo, the leading network in the Middle East.

Viettel Group’s registered overseas investment has exceeded $2 billion.

Mytel is the brand name of Telecom International Myanmar—a joint venture between Viettel Global, a Viettel subsidiary, and its two partners in Myanmar, Star High Public Company and Myanmar National Telecom Holding Public (MNTH).

Mytel has the total investment capital of $1.5 billion, accounting for 66 per cent of registered Vietnamese capital in Myanmar.

With the project, Vietnam jumped from the 10th position to 7th among 49 countries and territories investing in Myanmar, and is the second largest ASEAN investor in the country (as of the end of June, 2017).

Mytel is the fourth mobile phone network in Myanmar, along with state-owned MPT, which has a 42 per cent share of the market, Telenor (Norway), which has 35 per cent, and Ooredoo (Qatar), with 23 per cent.

From having the lowest mobile phone usage rate in the world (higher only than North Korea), Myanmar has experienced a stunning growth in mobile phone SIM usage, going from 10 to 90 per cent only three years after opening its economy.

The total number of subscribers has risen from 600,000 to over 16 million.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) said Myanmar could quadruple its economy’s scale to $200 billion by 2030.

VIR