On September 5, 2023, Vietnam Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC)  issued Circular No. 10/2023/TT-BTTTT temporarily suspending the enforcement of a number of QCVN technical regulation (partial or whole) applicable  to 5G, WiFi, NFC, wireless charging devices, some marine equipment and a few other types of equipment to remove obstacles in implementing conformity certification, declaration of conformity and product quality inspection according to Circular No. 04/2023/TT-BTTTT.

This is due Circular 04/2023/TT-BTTTT had  issue on the capacity of domestic testing laboratories on Law on promulgation of legal documents, the Ministry of Information and Communications has issued documents at the circular level to temporarily remove obstacles in certification of conformity, announcement of conformity and state quality inspection in each stage period for 5G devices and other devices where domestic testing capacity has not met the test method requirements in national technical regulations. Summary of the content of Circular 10/2023/TT-BTTTT is as follows:

1) Temporarily suspend enforcement of a number of QCVN national technical regulations

(Temporarily, certification of conformity and announcement of conformity to these QCVNs are not required during the period of temporary suspension period)

1. Temporarily suspend enforcement of QCVNs applicable to 5G terminal devices, 5G phones, 5G base stations including QCVN 127:2021/BTTTT, QCVN 128:2021/BTTTT, QCVN 129:2021/BTTTT, QCVN 18:2022 /BTTTT  until December 31, 2023.

1. Temporarily suspending enforcement of QCVNs on emissions for equipment used in the maritime industry because domestic testing conditions is not yet available , as well as there are no foreign testing laboratories recognized under the MRA as of today till June 30, 2024.

1. Temporarily suspending enforcement of testing under extreme conditions (critical conditions) (suspending a part of the technical regulations) for 2G/3G/4G terminals and phones, WiFi devices, NFC devices, wireless devices SRD, wireless charging until December 31, 2023 or June 30, 2024 (depending on device type and applicable standards).

1. Temporarily suspend testing requirements that domestic testing laboratories may not able to test (suspending a part of technical regulations) for NB-IoT devices and SHF

2) The period of suspension of enforcement

Circular 10/2023/TT-BTTTT takes effect from the date of signing and applies to cases that have registered for quality inspection in the period from July 15, 2023 to present and have not yet been completed the procedures to obtain type approval certificate and declaration of conformity process.

3) When the period of temporary suspension ends

1. If the product has not been certified or declared conformity with all applicable technical regulations, the enterprise will have to perform supplemental certification of conformity, declaration of conformity or re-certification.

1. If the product has been type approved and declared for conformity according to Circular 04/2023/TT-BTTTT (testing and certification with full technical regulations, including testing under critical conditions), The certificate of conformity or the Notice of receipt of declaration of conformity will continue to be valid until the expiration date stated on the certificate.

Impact Summary:

1. For all products .

a.        Scenario 1 – If we do not certified for those standards that is suspended , we will need to certified the Product before the exemption/suspended period end to make sure it is comply to the requirement .

b.       Scenario 2  -  For those product that is fully certified before the circular , there are no need for recertification.

c.       Scenario 3 -  If we certified the item in MRA lab or Local lab ( which maybe available at end of September ) then we can get full validity until end of expiry of the cert.

        2. It is expected that by the end of September 2023 there will be a domestic testing laboratory accredited and designated by Vietnam MIC to test 5G NR terminals. So we might able to start prepare for it once there is a lab can test it .

       3. For marine equipment, in the event that the domestic testing laboratory is still not qualified for testing and there is no accredited testing laboratory for the specifications for the emission part, it is believed that the MIC will temporarily not r  regulate the enforcement of these standards in the next version of the circular.

       4. For Wireless charger ,we are still unclear about the application of technical regulations to this type of device as there are discrepancy between the testing requirements and the product standards . we will updates if there are any news..

    5.  Manufacturer and importer may still encounter problems when testing under extreme conditions on big-size devices such as base stations or out-door equipment designed to operate in wide temperature range such as -40℃ ~ 100℃. It is because of the temperature chambers of local labs are small or can run at -20℃ only.

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