VietNamNet Bridge – Vietnam’s revenues earned from services on the Internet will have amounted to nearly VND20 trillion next year and five times that number in 2018, said an industry player at a seminar in Hanoi last week.

General director of VNG Corporation Le Hong Minh told the Vietnam Internet Day 2013 organized by the Vietnam Internet Association in Hanoi last week that the Internet-based business has been growing fast in Vietnam in the past decade and many sectors are capitalizing on the Internet rapidly. Total revenues of services using the Internet and Internet services were only VND70 billion in 2004, VND2.6 trillion in 2009, but the amount is forecast to reach VND20 trillion next year.

Minh’s company this year is expected to obtain a revenue of VND2 trillion from the Internet. Minh said next year’s Internet revenue of VND20 trillion would include revenues from online games, e-commerce and digital contents.

Le Thi Ngoc Mo, deputy director of the Telecommunications Authority under the Ministry of Communications and Information, said that Vietnam currently had 19 million users of mobile Internet and five million fixed broadband Internet subscribers.

While Vietnam’s online advertising fetched VND20 billion in 2004 and VND300 billion in 2009, it is estimated to amount to VND2.2 trillion (or around US$100 million) this year.

According to statistics of VNG, Vietnam earned VND1.2 trillion in revenues from online games in 2009 and an estimated VND6 trillion this year. Meanwhile, this year’s estimated revenues of e-commerce activities and web content services are VND4.2 trillion and VND8 trillion respectively, rising from VND100 billion and VND1 trillion in 2009.

VNG forecasts revenues of content services on the Internet to reach VND100 trillion in 2018, with online advertising rising by four times to VND8 trillion, online games doubling to VND12 trillion, e-commerce VND60 trillion, and web content VND20 trillion.

The Internet service penetration rate in Hanoi and HCMC has risen to 50-60%, which is almost equivalent to the rates in developed countries. However, the nationwide rate is at the middle level of the world.

Source: SGT