HANOI IS ON THE WAY TO BE AN INNOVATIVE CITY…

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Written by Doan Lan Hanh (Ms), Nguyen Thi Minh (Ms), Tran Bao Minh (Ms) and supervise by Chu Thi Hai Anh (Ms)

It is no doubt that Hanoi has the strongest infrastructure, many professors – doctors, who contribute the highest ratio in the proportion of national science and technology potential. We can see from below table of comparison between two biggest cities of Vietnam:

Number of Institutions in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh city, 2019   
    Row LabelsCount of Institution
Hanoi129
Academy30
College33
University66
HCM108
Academy8
College48
University52
Grand Total237

Sources: Ms.Minh – Writer

Besides, in 2019, Hanoi had nearly 5,000 international publications on scientific and technological research, accounting for 40% of the country. From 2016 to 2020, Hanoi has 346 provincial Science &Technology missions which were implemented, including 212 natural science and technology tasks, 84 humanities and social sciences and 50 experimental production projects with a total budget of 633,092 billion VND; more than 85% of research results after acceptance are applied in practice (Source:Labour Magazine, 2020)

Team Cobtain from Hanoi won the first prize in SAGE Global 2020 International Youth Entrepreneurship Contest with the corn-lep recycling project.

Source: https://vietnamnet.vn/vn/giao-duc/7-hoc-sinh-ha-noi-gianh-giai-vo-dich-cuoc-thi-khoi-nghiep-tre-quoc-te-665783.html

Another key thing to remember, Hanoi is holding the top position in the country for labor productivity. The labor quality has been getting better in recent years, thanks to the high quality and up-to-date training programs in universities as well as other types of training centers.

Right place, right time and right resources – it comes as no surprise that more and more young people decide to start their own businesses in Hanoi. Various contests and events were held in Hanoi in order to provide further support to start-ups and entrepreneurs, such as: Start up Journey 2018, Start-up Hunt 2020, TechFest Vietnam 2020, Creative Designs for Hanoi Spaces 2020-2021, etc. Throughout these events, a lot of new ideas were discovered and implemented in the fields of agriculture, digital technology, architecture… Hanoi youth also actively participated in international contests and obtained remarkable results.

On the other hand, despite having all these favorable conditions, Hanoi is still struggling to unleash its full potential as an innovative city, mostly due to out-of-date policies and slow responsive actions from the regulators. For instance, from Ms. Hai Anh – Cofounder of SpaceShare – a tech startup, they succeeded in calling fund from Japanese investors but had to wait 5 months to receive money into their bank account due to Vietnam’s complicated investment procedures for foreign enterprise. Another example from CIMB Bank Vietnam Limited, in collaboration with Korea’s first Fintech unicorn – TOSS recently launched the product “TOSS card by CIMB”. This is Vietnam’s first ever bank account that can be opened and maintained online, straight from the non-bank app using EKYC. While many perceived this as a true breakthrough in the banking industry, the State Bank of Vietnam was uncertain and raised many doubts before the launch since no regulation exists for this strange partnership concept. CIMBVN was finally given clearance with warnings from the SBV on risk acceptance, however this goes to show somewhat out-of-date Vietnam’s regulations.

With new ideas bustling from every corner of Hanoi, we are hopeful that in the future, policies makers and innovators will share the same vision of making Hanoi the most innovative city.

Source:

  1. https://tuyensinhso.vn/khu-vuc-he-cao-dang/khu-vuc-tp-hcm-c13984.html

A quick look on Hanoi’s Innovation movement throughout six typical lens

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by Tran Hien Ly, Nguyen Quy Hieu and Tran Thi Thanh Huong,

This December, we are learning about innovation, its development trend, and especially it should be sensed in every breath of lives. Innovation can be classified into six typical areas, i.e., Product, service, usage, Process and organizational, Sales and marketing, Business model and Technology and Society. It is relatively easy for us to agree Vietnam is seeing dramatic changes in the last ten years, but we wonder if our capital, Hanoi, is an innovative city?

In products and services, since 2016, Hanoi has 346 city-level science and technology tasks implemented, including 212 natural science and technology tasks, 84 social sciences and humanities tasks, 50 test production projects with a total cost of 633.092 billion VND (equivalent to 27.4 million USD). Up to 85% of research results after acceptance are applied in practice. In particular, research products in the fields of industry, automation, electricity, electronics and telecommunications have helped to develop new products that are competitive and expand markets and replace imported goods.

The conversion to the development of electronic government (e-Government) in Vietnam or Hanoi should be the best example of the city’s organizational innovation. In March 2019, a Resolution[1] was promulgated, highlighting a number of critical tasks and solutions to develop e-government from 2019 to 2020, with a vision to 2025, and was followed with a series of guidance documents. Key targets include improving the e-government platform to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of the state administrative apparatus and the quality of serving people and businesses; developing e-government based on open data and data towards the digital government, economy, and  society; ensuring information safety and network security.

When talking about sales and marketing, most people would expect a man wearing a suit and tie, ready to beg you to buy his product. In recent years, innovative forms of marketing blow new winds in Hanoi. i.e., electronic Know Your Customer (EKYC[2]). In August 2020, the government issued Decree No. 91/2020/ND-CP to fight against spam messages, emails, and calls. This law forced all people working in marketing to change their minds about telesales. This law also created a new field of innovation: EKYC – match the need of the customer as long as they stay online and searching in google. It is common in Hanoi to feel it; once you get online and search for something, the next thing you will see is ads and websites fitting with your desire. Not only do retailers exercise this kind of marketing, but also, all companies who wish to enter the online world do so. In a way, for better or for worse, EKYC is now the king, changing the face of sales and marketing in Hanoi in just recent years.

Innovation rarely comes easy; it is may like a hurricane, crushes through the old barrier, and changes the rules of plays forever. The business model is thought to be fixed by great successful companies, and none can change, especially in banking and finance. But in 2004, when the National Payment Corporation of Vietnam (NAPAS) was born, banks and financial organizations in Vietnam switched themselves to become connectors, helping the buyers to pay the sellers, no matter what bank they are using. In years to come, they speedup not only innovative online transactions for Vietnamese banks but also put a new definition to data sharing and transparency. Recently in 2019, they managed to push the seven largest banks in Vietnam to publish new kinds of cards, which help speed up payment and made the transaction more comfortable than ever. In the future, what else could they archive? Who knows?

When you are out, what is your attached thing? A mobile phone?  It is a “yes” to most of the young people now in big cities like Hanoi. With your mobile and a connected bank account, you do not need to bring your purse anymore. Banking and telecommunications companies in Vietnam have been applying most technological innovations in the last five years. Artificial intelligence is broadly used to replace traditional customer assistance and services. In 2020, the State Bank of Vietnam estimates that there are 30 million Vietnamese using internet banking every day, transactions on mobile banking increases at 200% with a total monetary value up to 13 million USD per day.

Vietnam also experienced an apparent social change during the outbreak of COVID-19 in late 2019. The government quickly reacted and applied innovative actions to fight potential threats from the first wave of disease transmission in China. Some examples to be named, setting up a Steering Committee, publishing and sharing widely prevention measures, deploying new applications to track people’s travels and connections, circulating update/warning messages to every mobile phone user, etc. Those rapid responses helped constrain the number of infected people to less than 1,400 to date and the death toll is 35 only.   

We may say, Hanoi, as the heart of Vietnam, is not outside of the innovative trend in the world. Moving forward, or you are left behind. The critical question here is how Hanoian and Vietnamese people can develop while preserving our traditional indispensable values of culture, environment, and society. Sometimes, it is useful to stop, re-think and see if we are heading in the right direction.  

[1] Resolution No. 17/NQ-CP dated March 7, 2019

[2] https://ekyc-vietnam.com/vi/?gclid=CjwKCAiAiML-BRAAEiwAuWVggkiNfduugNhtikfd5kzwxcoRsh3bo9skDMR8r-Byy8gu6igzQ4d8TBoCuNQQAvD_BwE

My most inspiring teacher: Mr Patrice Bonneau

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By Thu Trang Võ

Clock Exercise: Realising what is real value for customers

This article is reserved for my most inspiring teacher: Mr Patrice Bonneau. I first met him in Marketing of Innovation course. With years of working experiences as a consultant of innovative marketing, Patrice has typical characteristics of marketer: Creative, optimistic, talkative, social and outgoing. Although his way of describing things is quite difficult to understand literally, I succeeded in changing my mind towards creativity and applying his method – Semantic Analysis into our project KIDCOM.

We experienced this exercise at our first lesson, in which we imagined that we were Clock Manufacturer. We were ordering R&D to design a new model of clock. Patrick showed us 20 different models of clock and then asked us to choose the most appropriate one for the launching event. Each model appeared in just 3-5 seconds and we had to make decisions immediately!

By Patrice’s facilitating and guiding, we identified 4 main criteria to assess the model: Readable, Precision, Reliable, Fashionable. After that, each of us voted for our choice. Finally, Patrick summed up the results as the table.

Next, he asked us if we were customers, how much we were willing to pay for our chosen model of clock. He showed us the real price later.

Here we discovered the difference between the eyes of an engineer and the eyes of a customer. Engineers focus more on functions, features, quality of the clock while customers choose the clock that they like – base on their emotions. In this case, engineers are standing on the Usable Value’s View. Customers pay more attention to Estimate /Attractive Value of the product.

Who pays for the products and brings money to companies? The answer is clear: Customers. How do customers think this product is valuable while the other is cheap? All is just estimated by customers, not by engineers. 

Without speaking out, Patrice made us understand that when designing a product/service, we should put ourselves in customers’ shoe to think what is really value to them. 

Wow, learning through experiences – a method that I, as a trainer, used a lot in my courses was applied creatively by my beloved teacher. Thank you, Patrick, for opening my mind and make a better of me.

4 VIETNAM ACCELERATORS AND INCUBATORS FOR INNOVATION STARTUPS

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Vu Thi Hong Ngoc

Vietnam is one of the fastest growing countries in ASEAN. It is also considered a rising creative hub in Asia thanks to its rising affluence and prosperity, greater ease of doing business, wider and faster Internet and mobile connectivity,…. They are factors that help the startup ecosystem to flourish.

If you’re thinking about basing your startup in Vietnam, expanding into this promising market, or if you simply want to find out more information about the programs available, please find below the list of 4 accelerators and incubators in Vietnam. It is especially useful if you have a/some innovation idea(s), as the accelerators and incubators will help you to drive it into reality.

1. Vietnam Silicon Valley

Location and Contact Information: 

About: Under development by the Ministry of Science and Technology in conjunction with the Vietnamese Government, Vietnam Silicon Valley accepts raw startups with just an idea, to companies with a significant user numbers and prior investment. It focusses on online gaming, mobile applications, e-commerce, e-learning, technology-applied businesses and digital media sectors.

Offer: 

  • Four-month intensive program. Funding amount ranges from US$10,000 – US$25,000, with 10 per cent equity taken. 
  • Vietnam Silicon Valley provides legal and business consulting, along with office space.
  • Startups will have a chance to pitch to angel investors, and local and global venture capitalists at the end of the program.

2. IDG Ventures Vietnam

Location and Contact Information: 

  • Hanoi Office:
  • Address: V Building, 5th Floor, Unit 502, 125-127 Ba Trieu Street, Hai Ba Trung District, Hanoi City, Vietnam
  • Phone: (84-4) 2220-0348 | Fax: (84-4) 2220-0349 
  • Ho Chi Minh Office:
  • Address: Centec Tower, 5th Floor, Suite 504C, 72-74 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street, District 3, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
  • Phone: (84-8) 3827-8888 | Fax: (84-8) 3827-8899 
  • Email Addresses:

About:  IDG Ventures has a history of working with companies which are at the early-stage. It typically invests in companies with a focus on consumer technology, media and ICT sectors.

Offer:

  • IDG Ventures helps innovative companies to grow on a global basis with US$100 million under management. 
  • IDG Ventures provides strategic guidance, business development, marketing and recruitment support.

3. Hatch! Ventures

4. VIISALocation and Contact Information: 

About: Hatch! Ventures has been established since 2012. It is an NGO consisting of four pillars: community building, co-working space, seed-funding and startup incubating. HATCH! Ventures’ programs have attracted +100 supporting entrepreneurs and + 10,000 startups participating. All income of HATCH! Ventures is used to re-invest in activities supporting for startup ecosystem in Vietnam. 

Offer: 

  • Three-month program. Each startup is matched with one to three mentors with different expertise. 
  • HATCH! Ventures helps startup to refine business plans, provide insights, knowledge and experience in a specific field, as well as expand the startup’s network.

4. VIISA

Location and Contact Information: 

  • Address: 1bis Nguyen Thi Minh Khai, Ben Nghe, District 1, Ho Chi Minh City
  • Website: http://www.viisa.vn/

About:  The Vietnam Innovative Startup Accelerator (VIISA) is an accelerator program and seed stage fund that will invest $6 million to build global-ready startups in Vietnam. VIISA is powered by FPT Company and Dragon Capital and partnership with AWS Portfolio Plus, Zendesk Startup Program, DigitalOcean HATCH!,….

Offer: 

  • Funding: Startup will receive up to $15,000 in cash; In-kind services including cloud servers, office space, and other resources during the course of the acceleration program in exchange for transferable equity.
  • Extensive Mentorship: Startup will receive guidance and support from over 150+ global entrepreneurs, investors, community leaders, and corporate partners.
  • Resources: Over US$100,000 worth of technical resources, access to IT consultancy, bank accounts and administration, accounting services and more.
  • Follow-on Funding: Promising graduates will be able to get follow-on funding of up to $200,000 from VIISA, should they secure a new round of funding.
  • Corporate Networks: VIISA’s corporate partners can help startups get in front of businesses and key decision makers
  • Corporate Networks: VIISA’s corporate partners can help startups get in front of businesses and key decision makers

Success of a company relies both on the contribution of marketing and sales team.

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By Do Qui Minh

Marketing and sales teams are both essential to the operation of a company. Although both teams has the same goal to enhance the revenue of the company, when they have to work together, they don’t always get along. In the case when the revenue go down, marketing blames the sales force for not having sufficient efforts. The sales team, in turn, complains that marketing sets prices too high and not doing any practical thing, or not even realize what is actually going on with customers. Marketing believes the sales force focuses too much on individual customers rather than big picture of the larger market.

When both teams are equally important, finding a way to enhance the collaboration between the two teams is essential.

One of the solution is to let the two team understand the role of the other, and that the function of the two team is to support each other rather than competition. This should be through communication with both teams. Marketing focuses on customer behavior of the whole market, branding to raise awareness for the initial sales potentials. They try to determine the preferential products and services, the right features and price. Sales can help marketing to identify the actual needs of the customers, which may not be reflected through market research.

Clearly defining the roles and responsibilities of the both teams is the first step to solve the conflict.

The second solution is about communication. It is essential to keep sales in the loop of a marketing plan, and vice versa. Organize regular meetings to discuss mutual opportunities and issues. Disciplined processes and guidelines should be used to operate

The third solution is about KPI. Although the two team shares the same goals to improve revenue, their KPI are usually different. In order to measure the effectiveness or productivity of the two teams, there can be mutual factors in the measuring of the two

Success of a company relies both on the contribution of marketing and sales team. The Improving the collaboration, reducing conflict between the two teams needs to be carefully considered by the managers and leaders.

Alliances / Partnerships/ Sharing Economy – More than a course

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By: Dang Son Duong

Thanks to the Master 2 Innovate Project Management Program, we had a wonderful week with Mr. Aaron EVERHART, board member of Hatch Ventures.

During his course, we had chance to meet some interesting persons. Everynight he invited one expert come and talk to us. 

Mr Quentin Frecon from School Lab
Mr. Hung from YOLO

Especially, we have one nigth at Vietnam Silicon Valley. Studying out of the class give us a very interesting experience.

Studying at Vietnam Silicon Valley

We understood more about the importance of Partnership and Sharing Economy. Especially, my Kidcom Project found the very important partner that can help us to bring our project into reality. 

Ms. Dau Thuy Ha from KidsOnline, our partner

Ms. Dau Thuy Ha is chairman of KidsOnline, a company that provide preschool management software – Application to connect families and schools on the internet platform (online). She have very strong relationship with many preschools and she is very interested in our ideal. Becoming a partner of KidsOnline is very important for us at the beginning. Ms Ha helped us finding the investors and a very good supplier from Singapore. She also offered me to become the CEO of Rvi Centre (one of her company).

Thank Master 2 Innovative Project Management Program for bringing to us great opportunities and valuable experiences!

Each enterprise should be a centre of innovation

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By: Dang Son Duong

The Vietnam Government official made the remarks while attending the “Business Revitalisation and Innovation: Breakthroughs from Mind to Action” CEO Forum 2019 held on April 5.

Addressing the forum, Deputy PM Hue affirmed that the Party and State advocate the transformation of growth models based on the application of science and technology and innovation in order to improve the productivity, quality and competitiveness of the economy.

Deputy PM Vuong Dinh Hue speaking at the forum

Deputy Prime Minister Vuong Dinh Hue said that each enterprise should be a centre of innovation amid the urgent requirements of innovation in mind and action

The government has increasingly improved the business environment and strengthened the macroeconomic foundation, in addition to promoting the start-up ecosystem and innovation and creating the most favourable conditions to support enterprises.

He emphasised that creating breakthroughs is the message that the Government wants to deliver to all ministries, localities and enterprises to achieve the socio-economic targets in 2019 and the five-year socio-economic development plan in the 2016-2020 period.

Enterprises cannot go alone in their process of innovation, thus, the Government is committed to accompany enterprises in such a difficult but promising career, Deputy PM Hue noted.

Thanks to the Master 2 Innovate Project Management Program, we have known about concepts and applications of innovation and how important it is. In my point of view, not only each enterprise should be a centre of innovation, but also each university. People who graduated from universities may become high quality manpower in the future.

Futhermore, universities and enterprises should consider about sharing economy. The sharing economy can refer to social peer-to-peer processes that include sharing of access to goods and services,or any rental transaction facilitated by a two-sided market, including business to consumer. Universities and Enterprises can collaborate with others to be more successful in the future.

Thank Master 2 Innovative Project Management Program for bringing to us great opportunities and valuable knowlegdes!


Team management – An interesting course

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By Ha Trang Nhung

Thanks to the Master 2 Innovative Project Management Program, we have chance to meet Dr. Corinne MIRAL, a professor & researcher at Nantes University and head of doctoral school. She is very nice and helpful.

During her course, we had chance to experience lots of interesting activities and teamwork. One of the interesting thing is the workshop with Vietnam Laughter Yoga Club. Mrs. MIRAL Corinne has invited them to the class. They explained us the effect of laughing to our health, our spirit and our attitude to life and taught us some basic laughing yoga techniques. We enjoyed it very much and found it really useful because all of us are often stressful because of being overwhelmed with workload during the day time and intensive training program during the evening.

Another interesting activity is team building game, which is very relaxing. And at the same time, it taught us how to be a team leader, how to be a good member in the team.

Thank Master 2 Innovative Project Management Program for bringing to us interesting and valuable experiences!

The change which I am proud of…

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By Ha Trang Nhung

Mrs. DANIELLE PAILLER during the Change Management and Culture course has told us a sentence that is “Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing him/herself”. I love this sentence very much. And following I will tell you the story which made me decide to make change of myself.


All of you must know the Honda cub, a very simple and cheap one. But even the cheap one, until the year of 2000, my family still did not have. My father went to work by his bike. When I was 12 year old, my uncle sold his old Honda cub to my father. He was so happy and took it to go to the office. But soon after 1 or 2 hours later, my uncle informed that he changed his mind and he wanted to take the motorbike back. Never in my 12 years existing in the world, I saw such a frustration on the face of my father. And it changed me absolutely from that moment. 


I used to be very lazy at studying. I did not care about studying. The reason was that I was born in a remote village where everyone was farmer from this generation to the next ones and no one care about studying. For them, studying is something difficult and unaffordable and a far-away reach.  There was no one reach university level before. 


From the moment I saw the desperate face of my father, I changed to a different one. Why my uncle had motorbike? Because he had a good job, which was not a farmer as the other people living in my village. He did not live in our village, he moved to the city, he was a doctor. I realized that I have to study because knowledge is the way to make money to buy a new motorbike for my father. 


After that, I realized much more things. I realized that there are so many new & interesting things outside my small village. Life is much greater than what I saw in my umbrella. The change led me to the famous and big secondary school, high school and university. And because I changed, I made some of my close friends change too. And we were the very first people in the village reaching to university life. After that, more and more families in our village changed their mindset and they invested in the education for their children.


Thanks to the lecture of Mrs. DANIELLE PAILLER, I realized that I have mobilized my INTRINSIC CULTURE to change myself. By nature, I am not the lazy one, also not stupid but the EXTRINSIC CULTURE made me have no intention in serious learning. Environment and culture is not the deciding factor to our destiny but they have big effect on our lives. We cannot choose where we were born but we can choose where we stay and develop our life. 

LEARNING CHANGE MANAGEMENT SUBJECT THROUGH “NET HUE” RESTAURANT DISCOVERY.

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Nguyen Thi Thu Thuy

“Net Hue” Restaurant is one of the most famous traditional restaurant in Hanoi. Hue cuisine is not only a simple food, through “Net Hue”, Vietnamese diner shall have a better understanding about the history of Vietnam and the Nguyen Dynasty from the 18th century.

Moreover, Hanoi’s customer does not need to go far to enjoy the traditional food of the regions in Hanoi. Hue food enriches the culinary arts of Vietnam, elegant music of Hue royal court is preserved and developed.

Through the discovering and exploring “Net Hue”, we realized that, to attract more customers to the traditional restaurant, the following factors are important:

  • Preserve the name and characteristics of the traditional cuisine
  • Decorate Restaurant with pictures and items which relate to Hue culture and history.
  • Display video and clip about Hue food in big flash screen

Change management! Change to fit, change to be better and we can learn “change management” in anywhere! An interesting subject! An innovative way of learning!