The figure, including both earnings from Viettel Global and the Peru market, was 9 times higher than the average level of the world’s telecommunication sector, as recently released by the Military-Run Industry and Telecommunication Group (Viettel).
The Vietnamese giant also said that its new foreign markets in Africa and America continued to see rapid growth. Particularly, Viettel Cameroon surged by 103 % while Viettel Mozambique and Viettel Peru increased by 79 % and 37 % year on year, respectively. Viettel’s turnover from overseas investments rose by 40 % in the fourth quarter of 2017 against the same period last year.
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Bitel is a Viettel's branch in Peru |
Viettel is the only Vietnamese-invested company that reached the total turnover of more than USD 1 billion from overseas investments. At the end of 2017, the total number of customers using its telecommunication services in foreign markets was more than 43 million, up by 15 % from the previous year, which was five times higher than the average growth rate in the world, and much higher than the average growth rates of 6 % in Africa, 3 % in Asia and 3 % in America.
Although the group prioritized its resources and investments for its new markets, like Tanzania, as well as for the building of network infrastructure in Myanmar in 2017, it still maintained a high growth rate in its earlier-invested foreign markets.
The early deployment of 4G services to 7 out of its total 10 foreign markets has contributed to the growth rate last year. Its average revenue per user (ARPU) in 2017 also jumped to 20 %.
Alongside providing telecommunication services, Viettel also offered information and technology (IT) applications to local companies and governments in its foreign markets, which contributed importantly to its turnover in 2017. In fact, its earnings from IT projects with overseas foreign companies and governments rose by 6 times from the previous year.
In 2018, Viettel has planned to reach a turnover growth rate of 32 % while it strives to bring up the total number of subscribers on its foreign markets to 50 million, a year-on-year 16 % increase. Specifically, it has set growth rates of 70 %, 21 % and 20 % for Viettel Tanzania, Burundi and Viettel Peru, respectively.
Apart from Vietnam, Viettel is running business in Cambodia, Laos, East Timor, Haiti, Peru, Mozambique, Cameroon, Burundi, Tanzania and Myanmar. Of these, it takes the lead in five foreign markets in terms of market share. Furthermore, it earned profits from the foreign markets, in which it has invested and operated for more than three years and above.
Viettel is listed as one of the 30 telecommunication companies with the largest numbers of customers in the world. This is thanks to its long-term strategy to expand business into foreign markets.
Viettel is expected to officially start to provide telecommunication services in Myanmar, which is considered one of its potential and key markets in the future.
Translated by Hoang Quan