VietNamNet Bridge – Many Vietnamese people are ready to spend tens of millions dong just to buy a smartphone. However, most of them just use the smartphone for simple purposes, such as making calls, playing games or listening to music.

The fact that smart phones have been selling like hot potatoes in Vietnam, a poor country with the average income per capita at $1000 per annum has surprised many foreign businessmen. In Vietnam, individuals with the monthly income of 10 million dong would be considered high income earners. However, they would be ready to spend tens of millions dong, or their income of several months, just to buy a smartphone.

However, the strange thing here is that these people buy smartphones not to use the “Smart” functions of the phones, but just to become “connoisseurs”.

A lot of smart phone users have admitted that they only use smart phones for simple purposes, like making calls, playing games or listening to music. Nguyen Thi Lan, who lives in Thu Duc district in HCM City, said she was so happy after she successfully purchased an iPhone 4. Lan was not lucky enough to purchase the iPhone from the official distributor. She had to buy the phone from another person, who bought the phone from the distributor at quoted price and then resold to Lan at a price that was several millions of dong higher than the original price. However, Lan has been using the smartphone to make and receive calls. “Why don’t you buy another phone, which has the functions you want and it is much cheaper?” Lan was questioned. “No other phone can compete with iPhone 4. This is the hottest model now in the market. I have to use iPhone 4, because only iPhone 4 can show my class in society,” Lan said.

Meanwhile, Le Van Dung in District 3 in HCM City, has spent more than 10 million dong to buy a brand new 9800 BlackBerry. Dung said that he purchased the phone because BlackBerry is considered a symbol for businessmen because it looks very luxurious. However, Dung has been using the phone just to make and receive calls, saying that the thing that makes him most satisfactory about the phone is that he can create messages and send messages very quickly with the phone. When asked which operating system his phone is using, and if there is Wifi to make Internet connection, or if it is possible to surf on websites with the phone, Dung just smiled and said he does not know anything more about the phone, except the most basic functions.

Dung and Lan are not alone in Vietnam. Nguyen Duc Hoai, a technique officer of tinhte.vn, an information technology forum, who specializes in repairing smart phones for the clients of Tinh Te Café, said that many people know nothing about their valuable smartphones. “Many of them bring phones to me to ask to fix the errors with the software. Meanwhile, they can fix the errors themselves using very simple operations,” Hoai said.

In fact, Vietnamese smartphone users can learn about the “smart” functions of their phones from different sources, including on Internet. For example, information about how to unlock iPhone 4 for use in Vietnam has been updated on many forums. However, many people have not read the information and have to bring their phones to service providers and pay 500-700,000 dong for the simple service of unlocking the them.

That explains why many smart phone users have been described as “purse-proud”, because they use smartphones just to show off and to be connoisseurs.

Le My