Rafael Frankel, director of Public Policy for Southeast and South Asia at Meta Platforms, said at last week’s launch for the Vietnam Innovation Challenge 2024 that Vietnam will become a “dragon” in AI and semiconductor development in Southeast Asia.

Frankel is thrilled that the Ministry of Planning and Investment (MPI) chose AI as a priority area for the challenge. “We are creating an intellectual playground. It fosters ideas, and leverages opportunities within the semiconductor and AI industries. This initiative will help foster Vietnam’s dynamic tech sector integrate into the global digital economy,” he said. “We look forward to receiving plenty of brilliant solutions that will help pave the way for Vietnam to become an innovation hub of the region.”

Experts said Vietnam has unlimited room for generative AI, one of the tools that will greatly improve labour productivity in the near future. In the wave of development of AI technology, Vietnam has also taken strong steps in promoting AI research, application, and human resource development.

In Vietnam, people are becoming more interested in the benefits of AI and related software. In addition to renowned applications from OpenAI, Microsoft, and Google, some AI products made by Vietnamese people are in existence, such as the FPT AI Mentor (the first corporate training consultant in the country), an AI content writing assistant developed by LovinBot, VinAI’s open-source research project on a large language model for Vietnamese, and ViGPT, developed by VinBigdata.

Dang Huu Son, co-founder of the LovinBot AI, said, “Vietnam has seen an incredible pace of AI development at the global level. Particularly in Vietnam, generative AI is expected to contribute up to VND14 trillion ($583 million) to the digital economy by 2030.”

He added that AI development will impact the performance and improve personal skills of many generations, not only for businesses but also at a national level. “Vietnam leads a survey that people are truly interested in AI. Over 90 per cent of respondents pay attention to this technology - the highest rate compared to other markets. Other schools were studied,” Son said.

In fact, FPT Group has been developing AI for many years, welcoming local and international AI talents to Vietnam. Over the past year, FPT has been upgrading the AI ecosystem with more than 20 solutions and services for 20 million users in 15 countries, with an average of 200 million visits per month.

Tao Duc Thang, chairman and CEO of Viettel, said that AI has been applied in many of Viettel’s activities. “In doing business, AI helps understand and personalise services for customers. Technically, AI contributes to efficient exploitation, automation, and error avoidance. In management, AI analyses data, predicts, and contributes to making better decisions.”

VNPT is developing a comprehensive AI ecosystem, then will provide AI platforms and services as software for society, businesses, and individuals. Besides these technology giants, other businesses like CMC, Vingroup, Masan, and VNG have also widely applied AI in production-business activities and provided AI services to customers.

According to American technological research and consulting firm Gartner, the global AI software market will reach $135 billion by 2025 with the growth rate at 31.1 per cent in 2025, surpassing the common rate of the entire software sector. IBM said that the AI market in Vietnam will be $100.2 million in 2024. Being a software exporter country, Vietnam has a great opportunity to participate in the world’s AI market share.

To seize the opportunity, in 2021, the Vietnamese government issued a national strategy on AI research, development, and application towards 2030. After two years of implementation, Vietnam has achieved encouraging achievements. In 2022, it ranked 55th in the world in the AI readiness index, up seven places, according to a report by Oxford Insights.

At the launch of the Vietnam Innovation Challenge, hosted by Vietnam’s National Innovation Centre in collaboration with Meta, a call was made for participation from individuals and organisations.

The challenge highlights innovation to accelerate the semiconductor industry and AI to go global. It aims to create an intellectual playground, bringing together resources for collaboration, generating breakthrough ideas, leveraging the potential, and seizing the opportunities of the semiconductor and AI industries.

“The initiative aligns closely with the context of the semiconductor industry playing an increasingly vital role in global economic competition, the rapid development of AI, and the Vietnamese government’s strategic focus on high-tech industries,” said Deputy Minister of Planning and Investment Tran Duy Dong.