Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh on April 24 presided over a conference discussing solutions to prepare human resources for the semiconductor industry. Deputy Prime Ministers Tran Hong Ha and Tran Luu Quang also attended the conference.

Vietnam plans to produce 50,000-100,000 semiconductor engineers as soon as possible as part of the plan to develop human resources for the industry by 2030.

Chinh pointed out that semiconductors is a fundamental industry of the three revolutionary transformations, namely digital transformation, green transition, and smart transition.

The world's semiconductor industry is unevenly distributed and developed, with the strongest growth seen in a few economies such as the US, South Korea, Japan, China, Europe, and Taiwan (China). But now, for many different reasons, the semiconductor industry tends to be diversified, with production, R&D and supply being relocated to other countries, including Vietnam.

“This is a golden opportunity and a great challenge for Vietnam, because we need to have infrastructure, institutional regime and labor force suitable to current conditions to satisfy the requirements for development and investment attraction in the semiconductor industry,” Chinh said.

If Vietnam can prepare human resources well, it will obtain confidence from its partners, and succeed in attracting investment and in developing the production and supply chain.

Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung said Vietnam now has a chance "which comes only once in every one thousand of years" to join the global semiconductor value chain. 

At recent high-ranking working sessions, the US side stressed that to grasp the opportunity, Vietnam needs urgent deployment, with focus on three core issues, including the development of a high-quality workforce.

Under the human resources development plan being compiled, Dung said in addition to producing 1,300 lecturers with international qualifications by 2030, Vietnam also strives to produce 50,000 engineers capable to undertake the work of all stages of the value chain.

It is expected that Vietnamese engineers will participate in designing, packaging and testing; will partially master packaging and testing technologies; and step by step master manufacturing technology.

HR Tower to attract R&D, producers

At the conference, Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung outlined some major ideas about Vietnam’s semiconductor development.

Hung believes that Vietnam needs to develop its semiconductor industry, but there must be a roadmap to follow, with three major phases, from now to 2030, in 2030-2040 and 2040-2050.

During the 30-year roadmap, Vietnam’s semiconductor will not only undertake stages and works of the production chain, but will master all the manufacturing phases. 

Vietnam needs to develop semiconductor industry together with major industries and digital transformation industry. Microchips are the input material of the electronics industry, and only those who can do well in the electronics markets will be able to master the semiconductor industry.

“All regional countries, including South Korea, Japan and China, which have succeeded in semiconductors, have developed an electronics industry,” Hung said.

A recent survey found that no country can "turn into a dragon’" without a developed electronics industry. 

“If we only make chips, we will rely on output and buyers who are electronics enterprises,” Hung said.

He also emphasized on the need to build a global human resources tower in the semiconductor industry from now to 2030. The tower will be like a magnet that attracts R&D and producers to Vietnam.

Regarding the training capability for the semiconductor industry, Hung said this would depend on re-training and short-term direct training.

Other countries need two years to train an electronics engineer to work for the semiconductor industry, but Vietnam will do this within 3-6 months or 12 months.

Policies  

Associate Prof Dr Vu Hai Quan, director of HCM City National University, stressed that to develop human resources for semiconductors, there must be policies with specific incentives for schools to produce engineers for the industry.

For example, the HCM City National University builds a lab and open it for universities in HCM City for common use. In this case, it is necessary to clarify where the investment capital for the lab would come from and how the financial and resources sharing mechanism should be.

FPT President Truong Gia Binh said Vietnam needs a breakthrough in the institutional regime.

Trong Dat