The Ministry of Science and Technology (MoST) will coordinate with relevant ministries to quickly finalize and announce national standards and technical regulations for smart cities.

This announcement was made by the National Digital Transformation Agency at the review conference of the “Sustainable Smart City Development Project in Vietnam for 2018–2025, with orientation to 2030” (Project 950) held on August 13 in Hanoi.

According to the Ministry of Construction, after over seven years of implementation, Project 950 has achieved initial positive results. Many localities have issued and executed their own smart city plans with creative approaches, such as Hue, Binh Duong, Da Nang, Quang Ninh, and Ho Chi Minh City, across priority fields like intelligent operations centers (IOC), GIS-based databases, healthcare, education, transportation, water supply, lighting, and especially online public services for citizens.

Smart city development has brought tangible benefits for society, offering citizens access to convenient digital services and transparent information on planning, healthcare, traffic, and education.

For businesses, it creates transparent investment opportunities and fosters innovation through open data infrastructure and new state policies. For the government, it provides breakthrough tools for effective management and faster, more accurate decision-making.

At the conference, Dinh Hoang Long of the National Digital Transformation Agency stressed that the core of smart cities is no longer about chasing technology, sensors, or cameras, but about organizing and operating cities more efficiently through digital data and technology, with close participation from the state, citizens, and businesses. Technology is merely a tool; the real issue lies in governance, institutional frameworks, and urban management goals.

MoST has set key directions for the next phase: moving from fragmented infrastructure to unified digital platforms under a “platform government” model, standardizing to ensure connectivity and interoperability, and shifting from procurement to service-based investment.

Long emphasized the urgency of standardization so smart city platforms can “talk” to each other. Without common standards, unnecessary technical barriers will arise, causing waste and slowing progress.

MoST commits to working with other ministries to complete and announce national standards (TCVN) and technical regulations (QCVN) for smart cities, especially standards for intelligent operations centers, within this year.

The ministry also plans to propose a Government Decree on managing and developing smart cities, providing a legal framework to unify understanding, define roles and responsibilities, and set mechanisms for investment, public-private partnerships, and controlled pilot projects.

A new national smart city strategy will build on Project 950’s achievements, starting with pilot projects - such as testing digital twin technology at ward/commune level in six centrally-run cities in 2025 - before scaling nationwide from 2026.

From the business perspective, Vu Viet Hung of Viettel Solutions also called for an early, unified decree with clear standards, roadmaps, and technical requirements for data and shared regional platforms.

He suggested setting up inter-provincial coordination mechanisms, building regional data centers and digital operation platforms under the “one platform - many services - shared with authorization” model, and involving key tech enterprises from the planning stage to ensure secure, continuously updated systems.

Huong Khe