Vietnam is in the early stage of AI development. It has made a strong start at the A level, and is, step by step, moving towards the B and C levels.
AI is present in Vietnam in all fields where data are generated and in automation, such as corporate financial reports, failure prediction or machine maintenance, and process automation.
Ha Binh Than, CEO of Lac Viet Computing Corporation, believes that AI will be popular thanks to mobile terminals, cloud computing, machine learning algorithms and deep learning on increasingly faster and stronger infrastructure, according to Moore's Law.
Bosch, the world’s leading group in terms of providing AI-based services, has been expanding its investments in Vietnam since 2008.
Robert Bosch Engineering Vietnam believes that the demand for AI is very high, especially in agriculture, service, environment, administration management and transport. However, the development has been hindered by the thinking that AI application is still ‘unnecessary’ or ‘too early’ for a developing country like Vietnam.
AI has been used at farms to predict crops, crop diseases, and increase yield and harvesting quality. Meanwhile, state management agencies use AI to manage traffic and replace paper tickets.
With AI, people can create apps that automate all of the aforementioned tasks.
According to Than of Lac Viet, there are four problems that Vietnam’s businesses need to solve, including market demand; manpower with good knowledge in theory in AI and related tools; data collection and issues that need to be solved with Vietnamese natural language.
Though technology giants and academic researchers have basic tools, it will be very costly to use them. They are still not flexible enough and it will take time to localize them. Therefore, Vietnam needs to seek manpower that can undertake this work, from universities, academies and research centers.
Than said all the issues are intricate and costly. However, if Vietnam’s businesses can do this, they will develop. Than said it is also necessary to find suitable marketing strategies for the development of AI apps in Vietnam.
Robert Bosch Engineering believes that AI is a long game and businesses cannot reap fruit after a short time of investment.
Most polytechnic universities and junior colleges provide AI training to students. However, the knowledge students can receive at school only ‘touch the surface of the submerged iceberg’.
According to Le Thanh Nguyen, director of the Saigon Hi-tech Park Incubation Center (SHTP-IC), the potential for Vietnam’s startups to develop AI products and commercialize the products are great. However, startups can only go fast and far if they can connect research centers, institutes and schools.
