How Vietnam’s Digital Ecosystems Are Breaking Industry Boundaries

Vietnam has over 70,000 digital technology firms generating revenues of $148 billion. The South Asian country has been on a massive growth trajectory since 2020. The number of digital firms had gone up nearly 50% since 2019, when the country had 45,600. It increased to 68,800 the following year.

The growth has beaten the government estimate of reaching 70,000 companies by 2025. The Digi-tech sector contributed 14.26% to the country’s gross domestic product. With a similar growth path, the government expects the sector to transform Vietnam into a developed country by 2045.

The government has advised companies to turn digital technologies into significant drivers of creativity and change. Of the $148 billion revenues, $136 billion came from exports, acknowledging the influence of domestic companies on the world stage. Artificial intelligence, big data, the internet of things, cloud computing, blockchain, and cryptocurrency are at the core of this growth.

Vietnam, A Star Shining Bright in Digi-tech

Like in most parts of the world, Covid spurred the phenomenal growth of digital technologies. In 2020, Vietnam was rated as the best-performing economy in Asia. The pandemic also forced enterprises to adopt digital technologies. From a mere 48% of companies having a digital presence in June 2020, it zoomed to 73% by January 2021. The spending on technologies also went up from 5% to 21% simultaneously.

The government, too, contributed by going digital. As of June 2022, 45.78% of government services were conducted online. The government estimates that by the end of 2023, the share of people using digital tech will go up from 18% to 50%.

The Vietnamese government has set out to achieve a 31% growth in gross merchandise value (GMV) from $22 billion in 2022 to $49 billion by 2025. The country has chalked out a national digital transformation scheme, focusing on developing digital governance, digital economy, and society and incubating digital solid technology companies.

IT services contributed the most to this digital growth at 30% of the total value, followed by e-commerce at 14.3% and hardware production at 12.83%. As of March last year, the ministry announced 35 digital platforms to develop digital governance, the digital economy, and society.

All signs are green for Vietnam on its journey towards transforming the country for the better.