Vietnam mobile phone, accessories exports hit $3B

Exports of mobile phones and spare parts for these devices in Vietnam have seen a spike in the first four months of 2012, growing 161.5 percent year-on-year to US$3 billion during this period and was the second biggest contributor to the country's exports industry.

According to a report by news site Viet Nam News on Tuesday, exports of mobile phones and accessories used to account for US$300 million to US$400 million a month but this figure has grown strongly to US$1.3 billion a month and have held second spot in the country's top export industries since last September.

The strong showing was attributed to the exports of South Korean electronics giant Samsung, with its Vietnam division churning out about US$1 billion worth of export products per month, it noted. The country's deputy minister of Industry and Trade, Nguyen Thanh Bien, added in the report that with this rate of growth, Samsung's export value could reach between US$11 billion and US$12 billion in 2012.

The company accounted for more than 70 percent of mobile phone exports, worth some US$6 billion, in 2011, stated Viet Nam News.

Besides mobile, Vietnam's electronics sector is also "increasing rapidly", aided by the contributions from Intel, Canon, Compal, and Foxconn, it added.

However, Le Ngoc Son, chairman of Viet Nam Electronics and Informatics Corporation, said in the report that while the number of Vietnamese electronics businesses "was large", they fail to compete with foreign competitors because of limited financing and technology. Foreign businesses take up 80 percent of the country's overall electronics market and account for 95 percent of its export value, the article said.

The country has nearly 500 local and foreign enterprises in the electronics industry, with Finnish phonemaker Nokia one of the more recent companies to contribute to the local market with the construction of its US$264 million plant in Bac Ninh province, it added.