State telecom giant VNPT has sought the government’s advice on divesting its stakes in one of its two mobile phone subsidiaries, VinaPhone and MobiFone, newswire Vnexpress reports.

A new regulation on telecom ownership taking effect June 1 stipulates that an investor with more than a 20 percent stake in one telecom firm cannot own more than 20 percent in another.

VNPT, as Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group is known, fully owns both VinaPhone and MobiFone.

VNPT’s options are to sell off either of the two subsidiaries network, merge the two firms, or sell 80 percent stakes in both companies.

Market analysts said the group was caught in a dilemma because both VinaPhone and MobiFone were too lucrative to give up. The latter contributes half of VNPT’s total profits.

But they also said merging the two networks would create a giant mobile phone company that could hurt competition in the market.

Pham Hong Hai, director of the Ministry of Information and Communications’ Telecommunications Department, told VnExpress that it would take a long time to either sell one of the companies or merge them.

“I cannot say how long because a final decision cannot be made in just a month or two. [But] the process must not go on for years.”

The equitization of MobiFone was scheduled for the second quarter of 2009, but was delayed.
Though the plan has been in the works since 2005, the firm only recently selected a foreign consultant and completed a valuation.

Source: Tuoi Tre