From your own countryman expert's mouth.
Will Viettel make 4G infrastructure equipment with Chinese chips?
NOVEMBER 17, 2016
VietNamNet Bridge – If Viettel uses Chinese components to make 4G broadcasting equipment, there will be latent risks in information security, scientists say.
Viettel has received a license to set up a public telecom network and provide standard terrestrial telecom services based on LTE-Advanced (4G) technology.
The military telecom group has also promised to promote broadband mobile services among Vietnamese consumers with infrastructure equipment and 4G core network to be produced by Viettel.
Unlike the other networks, Viettel tries to make telecom equipment, saying that 70 percent of its telecom infrastructure items would be designed and manufactured by Viettel by 2020.
The group said that all of its components, from core network (vOCS, MSC, EPC, IMS), transmission network (Site Router) to access network (eNodeB) will not rely on any suppliers. From 2018, Viettel will replace all imported core network components with the company’s products.
If Viettel uses Chinese components to make 4G broadcasting equipment, there will be latent risks in information security
However, analysts doubt that Viettel can make equipment. In the past, Viettel launched into the market some mobile phone models, such as Viettel V8403, V8404 and V8502.
However, these were not made by Viettel. The products were outsourced by Viettel to Chinese manufacturers and then labeled them as Viettel’s products.
Meanwhile, Viettel’s 3G USB models were also suspected as being provided by Chinese manufacturers – Huawei and ZTE.
Ngo Duc Hoang, director of ICDREC (Integrated Circuit Design Research & Education Center) which is well known for microchips, thinks that Viettel won’t use Vietnam-made chips, but foreign-made chips, though he said that even if this is true, this will still be an encouraging result of Vietnam’s electronics industry.
According to Hoang, there are different levels for ‘mastering technology’. If someone designs a product, then buys separate chips and components from different manufacturers, and assembles in accordance with their own design and runs the product with homemade software, this will be ‘mastering of technology at equipment level’.
At a higher level of mastering technology, a person would be able to make chips and equipment and run the product as designed.
An expert who asked to be anonymous said he believes Viettel is capable of mastering technology at the equipment level, if it has strong determination.
However, he warned that if Viettel uses Chinese 4G broadcasting equipment, there will still be risks in information security. Using Vietnam-made chips is an ideal scenario.
However, he admitted that this is not feasible in the current conditions of Vietnam. Therefore, Vietnam’s design and software are the two most important factors that a product must have to be recognized as a Vietnam product.
To date, the three largest mobile network operators – Viettel, VinaPhone and MobiFone – have a license to provide 4G services.