The military-run Viettel Telecoms has lost the bid for a telecom license in Myanmar to Telenor of Norway and Ooredoo of Qatar.

The two were picked at the end of the bid, according to a statement of the telecommunications contractor assessment and screening board of Myanmar (TOTSC) released on Thursday evening as reported by the Myanmar Times.

Ooredoon has pledged the highest investment of $15 billion to develop the telecoms network in Myanmar. The company also promised to facilitate 90 percent of Myanmar's population with the telecoms network within 2 years.

Meanwhile, Telenor committed to build a national mobile network, using HSPA and LTE technologies, for Myanmar, with a goal of finalizing the national network coverage scheme in 5 years.

Earlier, the House of Representatives of Myanmar said that the announcement for the telecommunications tender results will be postponed until the new law on managing the country’s telecommunications market takes effect.

But TOTSC decided to publish the names of the winning bidders despite objections from the House of Representatives.

The announcement of the winning contactors came after a long evaluation process with technical assistance from international experts starting early this year. The bidders were evaluated on 8 major requirements, based on the ability to provide network services as well as fee proposals made by the contractors.

In addition, the contractor is required to provide mobile services to at least 75 percent of the territory of Myanmar within 5 years, and provides a wide range of products and services at reasonable rates for the consumers in both urban and rural areas.

Earlier, there were 90 international telecommunications companies filing their bid submissions, before the list was shortened to 11 bidders, of which Viettel, Vietnam's sole representative, was also shortlisted to compete for a business license for 15 years in Myanmar.

Myanmar has 64 million people but less than 10 percent of the population has access to mobile phones, one of the lowest rates in the world. However, the government recently announced to increase telecommunications coverage to 80 percent of the population in 2016.

A pity

Viettel representative told newswire VnExpress that the bid failure is a pity for the group. As Myanmar is a potential market, right from the search for investment opportunities, Viettel is determined to compete with strong competitors in all aspects, from many countries around the world.

Therefore, the final result came not as a surprise to Viettel. Viettel representative said the group had future plans there but currently they cannot be disclosed.

A leader of a big Vietnamese business investing in Myanmar said the Burmese are thinking about the long haul and are based on market mechanisms to select the best service providers.

Myanmar seems to balance between financial resources and technology, as among the two winning contractors, Telenor has extensive experiences in technologies and has already set up a firm foundation in Latin America, while Ooredoo is the strongest financially.