The Hanoitimes - Viettel corporation, the nation's largest telecom, has surpassed rival VNPT Group in earnings for the first time, according to reports released by Viettel yesterday.

VNPT operates both of Viettel's chief rivals, Vinaphone and MobiFone.

Viettel's earnings through December totalled an estimated 140 trillion VND ($6.6 billion), compared to VNPT's projected total for the year of 130 trillion VND ($6.1 billion), said Viettel deputy director Nguyen Manh Hung.

Viettel expects to post a profit for the year of 27 trillion VND ($1.3 billion), up from 20 trillion VND ($953 million) in 2011 and triple the anticipated profits of VNPT.

Attempting to explain the cause for his company's failure to keep up with Viettel, VNPT chairman Pham Long Tran said the economic recession had negatively impacted VNPT's operations.

"The decline in fixed line telephone use in recent years has also eaten into our profits, with most of our revenue now coming from mobile users," Tran said.

Tran also admitted that VNPT, as a State-owned company, continued to have a cumbersome business structure and lacked a customer-oriented strategy.

"The annual growth in VNPT's revenue has stood at just 10%this year," he said. "This is a low growth rate with a low profit compared to the average level of other telecoms."

Viettel, which launched mobile services in 2004, about a decade later than VNPT, has moved aggressively to become the leading telecom in Vietnam. In addition to accounting for over half of the domestic mobile services market, the Viettel corporation has expanded services to six overseas markets, including Laos, Cambodia, Zimbabwe, Chile, East Timor, Haiti and Tanzania.