Vietnamese Minister of Science and Technology Vu Hai Quan last Thursday met with Vikram Rao, vice president, ASEAN Enterprise at Nvidia, to discuss cooperation.

At the meeting, Nvidia said Vietnam had made significant progress in building its artificial intelligence ecosystem, with participation from businesses, educational institutions, and technology partners.

The company currently works with several Vietnamese businesses, including FPT, Viettel and GreenNode, on developing AI infrastructure and capabilities.

Nvidia proposed four key areas of cooperation, including connecting Vietnam's AI ecosystem with the global ecosystem. Under the proposal, Vietnamese AI products, companies and capabilities would initially receive support to gain deeper access to ASEAN markets before expanding into international markets.

From language models to GPU infrastructure

The other three areas of cooperation focus on large language models, computing infrastructure, and AI talent.

First, Nvidia proposed working with Vietnam to develop a large language model (LLM) that Vietnam would control.

The company said it was developing open-source models, including Nemotron, while providing tools, data and solutions to help countries develop models tailored to their own data, languages and needs.

The second area is the development of AI infrastructure and GPU capacity. GPUs are processors capable of performing large numbers of calculations simultaneously and are widely used to train and run artificial intelligence models.

According to figures presented by Nvidia at the meeting, Vietnam currently has around 10,000-15,000 GPUs. By comparison, the company's representative said South Korea has about 50,000-60,000 GPUs and plans to increase that figure to 200,000-250,000 over the next five years.

NVIDIA proposed that Vietnam develop a national plan to expand AI computing capacity to serve government agencies, businesses, universities, and research and development activities.

The third area is developing AI talent, startups, research and education. Nvidia proposed expanding its Deep Learning Institute programs in Vietnam, with the aim of rolling them out nationwide and integrating them more deeply into training programs.

The company described Vietnam as one of ASEAN's dynamic startup markets and said it wanted to strengthen cooperation and support Vietnamese AI startups.

The two sides also discussed support for researchers, PhD candidates and students to participate in Nvidia's AI ecosystem.

To be turned into an action plan

Minister Vu Hai Quan said the four areas proposed by Nvidia were consistent with Vietnam's strategy and direction for developing science-technology, innovation and digital transformation.

He asked the ministry's relevant units to work with Nvidia to turn the four areas into a joint action plan, clearly defining tasks, resources and implementation timelines.

In response, Nvidia representatives said they welcomed the proposal and said the tech giant was ready to work with the ministry to develop a plan with specific pillars for the two sides to review and implement.

The meeting followed a cooperation agreement signed by the Vietnamese government and Nvidia in December 2024. The agreement covered the establishment of a Nvidia AI Research and Development Center and an AI Data Center in Vietnam.

Nvidia's R&D center will focus on AI, software and systems technology. Viettel's AI Data Center uses technologies supplied by NVIDIA.