Elon Musk’s SpaceX has put plans to launch its satellite service on hold in Vietnam due to Vietnam’s foreign ownership limits in the telecommunications industry, Reuters is reporting.
Foreign ownership in telecommunications services that include infrastructure are capped at 51 percent in Vietnam for most countries. Members of the Comprehensive and Progressive Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, however, can own up to 65 percent.
This follows on from reports last week that additional regulations had been added to a draft revision of Vietnam’s Law on Telecommunications targeting satellite internet. Specifically, it would require satellite internet providers to partner with domestically licensed internet service providers.
Analysis: Managing internet access is a cornerstone of Vietnam’s censorship regime. A number of popular websites, the BBC, for example, are blocked in the country for disseminating content perceived to be against the Vietnamese state. This blocking is at a domain level carried out by Vietnam’s internet service providers and therefore redundant in terms of internet service provided from outer space. It feels a lot like for the Vietnamese authorities, that this is the crux of the problem.