Le Nam Trung, deputy head of the Authority of ICT Industry, spoke at a monthly press conference held on May 13 about the development of the industry.

There are 45,403 businesses operating in the IT field. As of the end of 2023, about 1,500 Vietnam’s tech firms had reached out to the world market and brought turnover of $7.5 billion, equal to 80 percent of total revenue of Vietnam’s digital firms.

However, the figure is small compared with the spending of the world on IT products and services. Gartner predicted that global spending on IT in 2024 may reach $5 trillion, of which $1.5 trillion will be spent on IT services and communications, while $1 trillion will be spent on software and the remaining on other services.

Trung praised the great effort by Vietnam’s tech firms to open up new space for development, expand markets, increase revenue and affirm the quality of Make in Vietnam products and services. 

The presence of Vietnam-made products in foreign markets has helped grow the national economy and increase opportunities for Vietnam to join the global value chain.

International market analysis firms all put Vietnam among the first positions among countries providing IT services and software. Vietnam is praised for its financial attractiveness, high skills and readiness of the labor force, good business environment, and national digital transformation strategy.

“Vietnam’s great advantages lie in low-cost resources, new and dynamic ways, and the government’s high digital transformation capability. The potential and opportunities for Vietnam in the international market are great,” Trung said.

At a global digital cooperation conference discussing Vietnam’s tech firms’ opportunities in foreign markets held last March, many attractive invitations were offered by trade and investment representative agencies from the UK, EU, US, Australia, South Korea, India and Japan.

Will Lawrenson from the UK Embassy in Vietnam said with total technology capacity of $1 trillion, the UK has opened its doors widely to welcome Vietnamese tech firms.

Eunjung Han from EuroCham said there are great opportunities in the European digital market for Vietnam’s tech firms. She advised Vietnam to pay attention to e-commerce, digital ads, fintech and AI. In early 2024, the EU Parliament approved the Artificial Intelligence Act, the first code of conduct in the world in AI management.

The Japanese market also offers attractive jobs to Vietnam’s firms. Takeo Nakajima, chief representative of JETRO (Japan External Trade Organization) in Vietnam, said Japan is facing a serious labor shortage, especially IT engineers. Japan wants to cooperate with Vietnamese companies to create value together and share benefits.

Many Vietnamese enterprises have increased their business and investment activities in Japan, undertaking tasks related to complicated digital transformation activities. 

FPT Software, Luvina, VietIS, Tinh Van, NTQ Solutions, Kaopiz, CMC, HBLab, AHT Tech, Techvify, Bunbu, BCC IT Innovation, Rabiloo, Solashi, Goline, B&K and SYP are some of them. 

Deepti Mittimani from Incham said India wants to strengthen cooperation between the tech firms of the two countries. Vietnam’s digital firms can prioritize investment in information technology, namely digital communication infrastructure, 5G services, electronic system design and manufacturing, data center. The Indian digital economy is expected to have value of $1 trillion by 2025.

Another priority could be fintech, especially insurance technology, digital banking, cloud-based software for financial technology. India’s fintech sector is expected to have value of $1.3 trillion by 2025 and $2.1 trillion by 2030.

And edtech is believed to have value of $225 billion by 2025.

Chris Morley from Austrade recommended that Vietnam’s digital firms exploit business opportunities in the fields of fintech, 5G technology, cybersecurity, electronic games and quantum technology.

Stephen L. Green, the US Trade Counsellor, said the US encourages Vietnam to cooperate with American firms. To date, investments by Vietnam’s tech firms in the US have reached hundreds of million of dollars.

Kim MinSeuk from KICC (Korea IT Cooperation Center) said South Korea anticipates that the country will seriously lack developers by 2027 (12.8 million in the field of AI, and 18.8 million in cloud computing). 

Binh Minh