On January 11, 2024, FPT officially announced its long-term goal of "stepping up to a higher level in the group of multi-billion dollar IT service firms" and set @ target of gaining $5 billion in IT service revenue from foreign markets by 2030.

More than two decades ago, in 1998, FPT began implementing @ globalization strategy, providing IT services to foreign markets with the ambition of bringing Vietnamese technology and intelligence to the world.

The firm groped around a lot for the path to foreign markets with industrial standard models and processes such as ISO (international organization for standardization) and CMM (Capability Maturity Model). It opened an office in Bangalore (India) in 1999, and then in Silicon Valley (the US) in 2000, but it faced failure.

The first client FPT got brought revenue of only thousands of dollars. Later, even when it obtained $1 million in revenue, it wondered whether it should pursue the dream of exporting software to the world.

FPT could take off only when it successfully entered one of the choosiest markets – Japan – in 2005.

Its team specializing in providing IT services to foreign markets has expanded from 17 staff to 30,000, of different nationalities. From Vietnam, FPT has reached out to the global market with presence in 30 countries, including the most developed markets, such as the US, Japan, Singapore and Europe.

From having no clients, FPT has become a reliable partner of nearly 100 companies in the Fortune Global 500. From doing outsourcing, FPT has become an advisor in digital transformation projects based on the latest technologies, capitalized at tens or hundreds of millions of dollars. From an unknown company, FPT has joined the playing field of firms with multi-billion dollars worth of revenue from IT services.

FPT president Truong Gia Binh has said that FPT always had to go looking for partners and clients, but now clients and partners come to FPT to place orders. 

“Vietnam has become a new destination, staying firmly in the second position in the world in software, just next to India,” Binh said.

Vietnamese firm of international stature

FPT focuses on developing the latest technologies and switching to higher stages in the technology value chain. The revenue from digital transformation services accounts for nearly 50 percent of total revenue from IT services from foreign markets. 

Of the new technologies, Cloud brings 40 percent of total revenue from digital transformation services, while AI and data analysis 12 percent, and RPA & Lowcide 10 percent.

The capability in new technologies is a "weapon" for FPT to compete with companies in the same industry from India and China, get large contracts and customers with turnover of hundreds of millions of dollars, and become the main contractor in large projects.

In 2023, FPT's profile of customers for the first time saw the appearance of a big client that brought revenue of $200 million. The client is headquartered in the US, and it is the only company in the world that provides comprehensive solutions to automobile distributors, including solutions to manage inventories, marketing, sales, post-sale service and operation.

Surpassing more than 100 other international contractors, FPT became its major partner providing consultancy and comprehensive solutions, from the platform to operate the business to digitizing of the process.

FPT became the main partner, providing comprehensive solutions, and helping the client sell 5 million cars each year in the US and optimize operation costs.

According to the world’s largest automobile wholesale platform, the partner sets high requirements on partners and FPT can satisfy the requirements.

In the past, FPT never dreamed of becoming one of the top IT service providers to the world’s aircraft manufacturers. But this has now occurred. It spent five years to persuade an aircraft manufacturer to choose FPT as a partner to deploy a digital transformation project. And now, both of the world’s leading groups in the field have been included on the list of FPT clients. Every flight of the manufacturer is implemented with code lines from FPT.

Thai Khang