A week-long series of events in Ho Chi Minh City is exploring the essence of Vietnam’s largest city and seeking an answer to the question of what makes the metropolis special.
‘Reinvent Saigon,’ which pays tribute to the former name of Ho Chi Minh City, is being held simultaneously at five locations in the southern hub from July 22 to 28.
The series of events is an effort of young people to recreate the ‘soul of the city’ through an artistic and commercial perspective, and to find the old Saigon in the city’s current state.
Nearly 40 events will take place at the following five locations of TOONG co-working space in Ho Chi Minh City: 20 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai (District 1), 126 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai (District 3), 87 Ham Nghi (District 1), The Vista An Phu (District 2), and The Vista Verde (District 2).
‘Reinventing Saigon’ is meant to portray Saigon with a fresh look, using elements from ancient heritage to the characteristics of a modern Vietnamese metropolitan with all its bustling vibes and dynamics.
Themed as a cultural festival, the series of events focuses on such topics as words and designs, cuisine, architecture and urban, and fashion and lifestyle.
Visitors to the TOONG co-working space at 126 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street can view a display of Tuoi Tre Cuoi Tuan magazines, a weekly publication published by Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper, taken from a private collection by retired journalist Nguyen Trong Chuc.
A collection of calendar artworks depicting the Saigonese lifestyle by graphic designer Thien Le in collaboration with Ho Chi Minh City-based English-language site Saigoneer will also be put on display at the location.
A food-tasting activity, an exhibition of Vietnamese culture-inspired works by young artists and a film screening will also take place at this address during the course of the events.
At 81 Ham Nghi Street, visitors can look back on the old maps of Saigon to see its development over time and take an interactive tour of the city’s ten most iconic buildings to test their understanding of Ho Chi Minh City.
Food lovers should not miss events being held at 20 Nguyen Thi Minh Khai Street, where all things related to the history of cuisines in the southern metropolis will be made available to visitors.
Fashion and lifestyle are the focus of exhibitions at the TOONG co-working space at the Vista An Phu apartment complex in District 2, where visitors can see how the old tailors of Saigon defined fashion for residents in Vietnam’s largest city.
At the Vista Verde apartment complex in District 2, the future is the recurring theme of art installations by several contemporary artists, tackling such issues as pollution and urbanization.
Fund managers drawn by innovation as south-east Asian country transforms
Vietnamese companies in sectors ranging from trucking to fintech and facial recognition are attracting a record wave of venture capital money, drawn in by the digital transformation and growing wealth of one of Asia’s youngest and fastest growing economies.
The country is making headway in the south-east Asian nations’ race to build their first “unicorns”, fund managers say. Such companies, with valuations of $1bn or more, gain the attention of foreign investors and help sustain a bigger venture scene.
According to Financial Times, the numbers show investments into Vietnam are growing in size and total amount. The country saw 24 deals worth $128m in the first half of this year, up from six transactions worth $12m in the same period a year ago, according to Asian Venture Capital Journal, a trade publication.
Among the Vietnamese companies that have drawn significant interest from regional and international investors recently are FastGo, a lower cost rival to south-east Asian ride-sharing company Grab; Abivin, which organises logistics for Vietnamese enterprises; and Logivan, sometimes described as an “Uber of trucking”.
“When we started 15 years ago, we were one of the few [private, start-up] companies,” Le Hong Minh, said co-founder and chief executive of gaming and media company VNG, Vietnam’s first unicorn. “Now there are hundreds and hundreds.”
VNG, which is relatively unknown outside Vietnam but comparable in its domestic reach to China’s Tencent, started out in online gaming and has expanded into news, payments, cloud computing and mobile messaging.
Venture capital deals in Vietnam
The company was valued at an estimated $2.2bn in its most recent fundraising, led by a unit of Singapore’s Temasek. VNG in 2017 signed an understanding with Nasdaq to pursue an initial public offer on the exchange, but has not yet done so, said Mr Ming, because of regulatory issues in Vietnam.
Payments start-up VNPay is also poised to enter the ranks of Vietnamese unicorns, DealStreetAsia reported this week, with a proposed fundraising of up to $300m from SoftBank Vision Fund and GIC, Singapore’s sovereign wealth fund. GIC, SoftBank and VNPay all declined to comment.
Regional expansion by Vietnam’s rising companies is one of the big themes Vietnamese and other Asian venture investors are tapping into, along with any business idea that takes advantage of either young consumers or digital transformation.
“Vietnamese companies going regional is one of the themes we look at,” said Don Lam, chief executive of VinaCapital, which launched a $100m venture capital fund dedicated to Vietnam last year, its second. “When we invest in Vietnam, we want companies to be able to say they can compete regionally, and hopefully globally one day.”
VinaCapital Ventures’ portfolio includes investments in Logivan, FastGo, and Wee Digital, a biometric and facial recognition company that recently signed a contract with Vietnam’s biggest conglomerate Vingroup to install its products at hotels and resorts.
Vietnam has reverse brain drain . . . We have people returning from the US who went to school there, or people like me who left as children. Justin Nguyen, Monk’s Hill Ventures
Many of the start-ups are being founded by returning members of the Vietnamese diaspora, or locals who worked or studied abroad before returning home to start companies.
“Vietnam has reverse brain drain. In a lot of countries, the best and brightest go to school abroad and stay there,” said Justin Nguyen, who heads Monk’s Hill Ventures, a VC fund focused on south-east Asia. “We have people returning from the US who went to school there, or people like me who left as children, bringing back the rich experience from abroad.”
Logivan’s founder Linh Pham is a University of Cambridge graduate and former Goldman Sachs analyst who got the idea for her business after observing the inefficiency of the trucking market at her family’s fertiliser business in Ho Chi Minh City.
She founded Logivan, which connects cargo owners with truck owner-operators, in 2017. Since last year, the company has raised nearly $8m from investors including Singapore-based Insignia Venture Partners and VinaCapital Ventures.
With nearly 100m people, Vietnam is one of south-east Asia’s largest countries, but still lags in critical mass behind Indonesia, its most populous, or Singapore, its richest.
Oliver Rippel, co-founder of Asia Partners, a new Singapore-based private equity firm that is raising its first fund targeting south-east Asian tech, said Vietnam would not be the first place to look for deal sourcing, compared to either Indonesia — which has produced four unicorns, including regional ride-hailing company Go-Jek and travel website Traveloka — or Singapore.
“So far the proof has not been in the pudding in terms of Vietnamese companies expanding outside of the country and into the region,” he said. “Singapore and Jakarta are the two main hubs we would look at,” he said, adding that Vietnam remained “a very important puzzle piece in south-east Asia”.
In establishing its first $1bn-plus unicorns, Vietnam is pulling ahead of Thailand, its more developed regional neighbour, which has yet to produce one. Still, investors are waiting for more. “You are going to need billion-dollar companies to make venture economics work,” said Monk Hill’s Mr Nguyen.
Swimmer Nguyen Huy Hoang has become the first Vietnamese athlete to book a slot at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, after meeting the Olympic Qualifying Time (OQT) at the ongoing 18th FINA World Championships.
On Tuesday (July 23) morning, the 2000-born swimmer competed in the men’s 800 m free freestyle and finished in 07:52.74, surpassing the OQT of 7:54.31 for the men’s 800m at the Games announced by the International Swimming Federation (FINA).
Hoang’s best achievement in this event is 07:50.20 when he won gold at the 2018 Youth Olympic Games in Argentina.
The Quang Binh native will continue to compete in the men’s 1,500 m freestyle on July 27. At the 2018 Asian Games, the 19-year-old won a historic silver medal for Vietnamese swimming in the event, only behind gold medallist Sun Yang of China.
Teenager Hoang finished 15th in the qualification for the men’s 800 m free freestyle at the 2019 FINA World Championships but it was still enough for him to book a ticket to Tokyo 2020.
In addition to Hoang, three additional Vietnamese swimmers were also competing at this year’s World Championships, including Nguyen Thi Anh Vien, Nguyen Huu Kim Son and Le Nguyen Paul.
However, promising swimmer Vien was not at her best as she completed the women’s 400 m freestyle in 4:13.35, only meeting the Olympic Selection Time of 4:15.34, far behind her best personal record of 4:07.96.
In the 200 m individual medley, Vien ranked 26th with 2:17.79 and could not enter the semi-finals. Kim Son ranked 33rd in the men’s 400 m freestyle (3:55.59), while Le Nguyen Paul ranked 46th in the men’s 50m butterfly qualifier.
Vietnam ranks fourth among the countries that house the largest amount of motorbikes in the world, according to Motorcycles Data’s statistics in 2018.
Accordingly, the Asia-Pacific region is the “gold mine” of motorcycle manufacturers in the world. The five largest global motorbike markets are concentrated here. India ranks first and the runner-up is China, followed by Indonesia, Vietnam and Pakistan.
Depending on each country, economic growth, population growth rate, transport infrastructure or shopping habit will affect the purchasing power of motorcycles.
The number of motorcycles in Vietnam keeps rising, according to the National Traffic Safety Committee’s report announced at a teleconference in Hanoi on July 22. In the first six months of 2019, more than 1.63 million motorbikes have been put into circulation, bringing the total number of to about 61.3 million motorbikes.
In the first half of 2019, Vietnamese people bought more than 8,300 motorbikes per day. Although Vietnam’s market potential for motorbikes is number four in the world, motorcycle sales in the country are in the top.
The National Traffic Safety Committee also reported 8,385 traffic accidents in the first six months of this year, killing 3,810 people and injuring 6,358 others. The figures dropped compared with the same period last year.
Traffic police handled nearly two million cases of traffic violations, issuing fines of over VND1.2 trillion (US$51.6 million), They seized 163,990 driving licenses and 292,000 vehicles.
In the time ahead, the Ministry of Transport will amend the Law on Road Traffic with more severe punishments on administrative violations in the sector.
The Ministry of Public Security will strengthen patrol to control, detect and strictly handle violations which are the direct causes for traffic accidents including overspeeding, drink-driving, not wearing seat belt on cars and helmet on motorbikes, among others.
New social network Gapo developed by Vietnamese made its debut in Hanoi on July 23.
The network was created by the tech firm Gapo Technology.
It has green background with interface, layouts and features similar to that of Facebook.
According to a report on VNA, besides basic functions of a social network such as messaging, updating status, adding friends, liking and sharing, Gapo has an additional feature of decorating stories and requiring identification of user accounts.
Users can use different wallpapers, colors, music, videos and even other interactive images.
In particular, this social network allows users to identify accounts to protect and secure benefits in case of disputes.
Gapo also has automatic keyword filtering and a team to censor bad news based on the information reported by users.
Users could experience the network by downloading it on Google Play Store, App Store, or go to http://www.gapo.vn to sign up.
At the launching ceremony, Gapo initially received and investment pledge of 500 billion VND (21.5 million USD) from G-Capital, which will be used in the first phase of the project, with the aim of reaching 50 million users by 2021.
Vietnam has been named in the top 10 countries for expats, according to HSBC’s Expat 2019 Global Report released in July 2019. Vietnam Insider talked with Rahn Wood, Deputy Head of Retail Banking & PMO at Eximbank Vietnam, about his experience of living and working in Vietnam.
Mr Wood is an internationally experienced executive with over 30 years of achievements in Retail, Commercial & Digital Banking, Cards and Payments. He has performed executive roles at some of the most prestigious financial institutions including HSBC (Australia, Hong Kong & Singapore), Vietnam International Bank, Techcombank, Saudi British Bank, Macquarie Bank, MasterCard and ANZ Bank. Throughout his career, he has authored, and in many cases implemented, a large range of strategic change programs and startups.
He is an engaging and bold leader with excellent analytic skills who is able to communicate between the boardroom and the showroom.
According to Mr Wood, Vietnam is like no other when it comes to being an expat.
Can you start us off with why you chose Vietnam and what were the circumstances of your decision?
In 2009, I was working with HSBC and had the opportunity to be seconded to Techcombank, in which HSBC was a strategic investor at that time. I had previously only worked in developed countries (Australia, Hong Kong, Saudi Arabia), so I was excited to apply my experience to a developing market. Being selected for an exciting role in Hanoi was good luck more than good planning.
Vietnam in that period was growing really fast. It was exciting. The other countries where I’ve worked are all very mature. The banking landscape is well-established and dominated by big banks. In general you couldn’t propose overly disruptive or ambitious ideas; in most situations you only improve on what’s been there for a long time. In Vietnam, especially at Techcombank, they were willing to invest aggressively in growth. I have fond memories of successful meetings where the CEO & Chairman supported my proposal to expand the bank’s network by up to 2,000 ATMs and 300 outlets. They were very bold. And it was the right time to do it.
Were there any initial challenges?
It was a very demanding environment. Although I had just moved from Hong Kong, I didn’t realize this was such a hard-working culture. People worked long days all week and then continued on Saturday mornings. If you proposed something, you were expected to deliver it very quickly. You just had to find a way to get it done. So creative-problem solving is an essential skill.
I remember that in my second year, my target was to expand the bank’s network by 117 branches and 500 ATMs. My cross-functional team made the ATMs target, but ‘only’ completed 107 branches. The CEO said, “Not bad, not bad, but you didn’t quite hit the target.” So the expectations were very high.
I also learned early on that I needed to adapt to the optimum leadership model. I needed to be there, in the moment, on the ground, with my team. You couldn’t simply call a meeting, assign tasks, and send an email a month later asking what happened. Everyone had to get together regularly, keep one another updated and work out any problems that needed solving. That’s the leadership model that works best here. It’s not an autonomous workplace, at least not yet.
Another thing that I realized over time was that Vietnam’s work culture is not entirely homogenous. Working in Hanoi is very different from working in Ho Chi Minh City. In my experience, Hanoi is actually a little bit like the Middle East in that people generally embrace strong leadership, whereas in Ho Chi Minh City management needs to be a lot more democratic. You need to bring people along with you. As I initially worked in Hanoi, when I carried over some of my ’Northern’ habits here [in Ho Chi Minh City], people would sometimes say, “He’s a bit pushy.” And the provinces are different from urban Vietnam. I think that’s another thing that expats should understand, that there is not just one approach to working in Vietnam.
Did you have any reservations about working here?
As a banker, career-wise there were some limitations to consider. Vietnam was a bit ‘off-the-map’ and not well-known as a leading financial services marketplace. If you were lucky enough to be involved in something truly innovative or expansionary, you could add that to your professional experience, but otherwise a lot of it is just catching up on what’s happening in other markets. So at the outset I had to ask myself, “Is working in Vietnam going to give me as many opportunities to grow as remaining in a developed market?”
Over time those initial concerns were outweighed by the opportunities and excitement of working here. I’m still finding new opportunities to enjoy my work and life in Vietnam after 10 years!
What are some positive and negative aspects of working in Vietnam versus other places you have worked?
A big positive is that this is a very young country. When I arrived, approximately 70% of the population was under 30 years old, and banking was quite an emerging industry. There was a tremendous amount of youthful optimism and energy, and everyone was open-minded and hungry to learn. It was really infectious. In developed countries, some banks are over 100 years old, and there is as much risk in changing things as there are benefits in innovating. In Vietnam, everybody seemed willing to try new things. Perhaps that might change as the workforce matures and banks get bigger.
The quality of living in Vietnam is also great. You can enjoy ‘a champagne lifestyle on a beer budget’. The cost of living is much lower, so you can live very well.
And then there’s the freedom. That’s another thing I didn’t expect, the personal freedom. You can dress casually, ride around on a motorbike, enjoy a beer, play golf, and not a lot of people will complain. Obviously you have to be careful to respect local customs, but nobody bothers you about the small things. I recently came back from my home country Australia, and there were regulations for every little thing: no drinking in public places, no eating in stores, acceptable use of public transport, etc. And when I lived in Singapore, they’re very conscious about language and someone might make a comment about your public behavior if you are too boisterous. It seems that people are willing to accept more individualism in Vietnam. I didn’t expect that.
Do you think you are treated differently from your Vietnamese colleagues? Have you noticed a different standard for your behavior, or do you think everyone is treated the same?
I think foreigners are treated quite deferentially. The big positive about this is that colleagues take you more seriously. They might think, “This guy has more international experience, we need to consider what he’s saying.” On the other hand, some people assume that you don’t have a long-term focus. They think, “This guy is only here for two or three years.” At times, there’s a stereotype that one needs to overcome.
Rahn Wood (right) and his colleague
Finally, do you have any tips for other expats and for our readers at Vietnam Insider about opportunities in Vietnam, now or in the future?
I would say that some business sectors are more innovative than others. For example, we are doing this interview in a coffee shop. There are so many models of coffee shop targeting different consumer segments that have come up in Vietnam, and some are very successful. Similarly there is an amazing range of restaurants and other industries that have developed very well in this market.
On the other hand, banks in Vietnam have mostly been applying traditional methods in order to close the gap with developed markets. Meanwhile, what you’re seeing globally, there are a lot of interesting developments in fintech models, start-ups, and disruptive innovations. Some of these developments are from new companies, but some of them come from established players like Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan. In Vietnam, we haven’t seen that so much. Financial services companies are mostly focused on standardization and digitization, in order to improve efficiency. You could call that evolutionary, rather than revolutionary.
We’ve seen some impressive results. Mobile banking is moving up fast, and banking is becoming more efficient and better controlled. But it’s still the same old business model. How do you get customers, especially Millenials, excited? In the coming years, I think Vietnamese banks will have to come up with new propositions, and become more relevant.
Vietnam is looking to tap into the enormous economic potential of its nightlife as Hanoi urges studying of policies to promote the nighttime economy being implemented by its northern neighbor China.
In a directive issued on Friday, the Office of the Vietnamese Government requested that ministries and local administrations study Beijing’s policies to promote its nighttime economy and make reports to the prime minister.
The nighttime economy describes economic activities taking place in the evening after many people finish daytime employment or formal education.
The Chinese government has since the beginning of 2018 imposed a range of policies to promote the country’s nighttime economy taking place between 8:00 pm and 6:00 am.
Ten night food streets, 16 nocturnal markets and 24-hour convenience stores in Beijing have become the first to receive a government subsidy to operate late at night.
On July 19, Beijing extended the running hours of its two main subway lines on weekends, requiring the last train to depart after 12:00 am every Friday and Saturday, according to the Chinese state-run Xinhua News Agency.
The capital city’s sub-center of Tongzhou District is looking to develop late-night cafeterias along the key subway lines and in administrative office areas, and encourage the building of 24-hour convenience stores, bookstores, chemists and movie theaters, Xinhua reports.
Shijiazhuang, the capital city of Hebei Province in northern China, has lowered the electricity price for stores extending running hours at night.
Such policies are being imposed across the world’s second-largest economy as China looks for alternative growth drivers to neutralize economic impacts of its ongoing trade war with the U.S.
Results have been uplifting. China’s night catering consumption jumped 47 percent in 2018 from a year earlier, two percentage points higher than the daytime growth, according to a report released by the China Tourism Academy and Meituan, a Yelp-like Chinese online city guide.
Young people were the largest contributors to nighttime consumption in China, with consumption value and volume of tourists born post-1980 accounting for more than 40 percent of the total during the May Day holiday, a report by the China UnionPay Merchant Services Co., Ltd. showed.
A model for Vietnam
In Vietnam, a nighttime economy has already taken shape in major cities like Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi, where pedestrian-only quarters, food streets, night markets and an extensive network of more than 2,300 convenience stores have lit up the cities’ night skies for years.
While China offers financial incentives for businesses to promote nighttime economy, Vietnam can simply offer transparent policies and mechanisms in order to attract investors into nighttime activities, said Huynh Van Son, chairman of Ngoi Sao Bien Travel, developer of a number of night markets in Phu Quoc and Da Nang.
At the moment, Vietnam’s tourist products are focused on daytime activities taking place between 7:00 am and 5:00 pm, while the period from 6:00 pm until 2:00 am the next day are left under-invested, said Nguyen Quoc Ky, general director of Vietravel, a leading Vietnamese tour operator.
It is at night that tourists tend to spend the most money, as 70 percent of Vietnam’s tourism revenue comes from nighttime activities and services, Ky said, citing a report
“All the fun activities in Nha Trang take place during the day while not so many are available at night,” said Maria Ekaterina, a Russian visitor to the south-central Vietnamese city.
“We don’t have many options except some bars and clubs that often only open until 1:00 or 2:00 in the morning.”
But careful planning and monitoring is necessary to avoid the negative impacts of nightlife, Ky warned.
“A lack of proper planning has turned the Bui Vien Walking Street [in downtown Ho Chi Minh City] into a ‘drinking street’,” Ky said.
“Meanwhile, the city’s Nguyen Hue Walking Street lacks cultural activities and is plagued by street vendors and littering, which is a shame.”
Nguyen Bich Lam, general director of the General Statistics Office of Vietnam, told Tuoi Tre (Youth) newspaper that ensuring safety and security for stores opening late at night is the key to promoting a healthy nighttime economy.
“This is a rather uncharted territory [for Vietnam] and we will be conducting surveys and studies in this field to introduce suitable support policies,” Lam said.
Selling pressure increased at the end of Monday’s session, affecting market sentiment and creating a big variation in large-cap prices.
The benchmark VN-Index on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange slipped 0.03 per cent to close at 982.04 points.
More than 164.4 million shares were traded on the southern bourse, worth VNĐ4 trillion (US$174 million).
The large-cap VN30-Index was down 0.13 per cent to end at 879.62 points.
Sixteen of the 30 largest stocks by market capitalisation ended the session on a negative note.
The market opened the week cautiously, with large-cap prices differentiated widely, causing market indices to fluctuate.
Strong pressure came from some stocks like Vincom Retail (VRE), VPBank (VPB), Vinamilk (VNM) and Vietinbank (CTG). VNM dropped by 1.1 per cent, VRE lost 1.9 per cent, VPB decreased by 1.5 per cent and CTG moved down by 1 per cent.
On a sector basis, 12 of the 20 sectors saw share prices drop, including securities, oil and gas, construction material, wholesale, seafood processing and food and beverage.
The 16 industry indices were down between 0.14 and 2.3 per cent, data on vietstock.vn showed.
Oil-gas stocks fell across the board by 0.6 per cent, mostly driven by PetroVietnam Drilling & Well Services Corporation (PVD) (1.08 per cent), PetroVietnam Gas JSC (GAS) (0.5 per cent), PetroVietnam Technical Services Corporation (PVS) (0.4 per cent) and Drilling Mud Joint Stock Corporation (PVC) (1.32 per cent).
Securities stocks fell 2.19 per cent, dragged by Hồ Chí Minh City Securities Corporation (HCM), losing 3 per cent, VNDirect Securities Corporation (VND), dropping 2 per cent and SSI Securities Corporation, falling 2.2 per cent.
On the other side, the general market decline was partly narrowed by the support of some leading stocks such as Bank for Investment and Development (BID), Bảo Việt Holdings (BVH), Kido Group (KDC), Masan Group (MSN) and Vietjet Air (VJC).
KDC was strongly affected by second quarter business results. KDC rose 1.3 per cent to VNĐ19,000 per share. Pre-tax and post-tax profit in the second quarter rose sharply, up 81.5 per cent and 130.3 per cent, respectively.
VJC announced that it was approved by the Securities Commission to buy back a maximum of 25 million shares (equivalent to 4.61 per cent of charter capital). The transaction is carried out via order matching or put through the method on the Hồ Chí Minh Stock Exchange from July 26 to August 23, 2019.
On the Hà Nội Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index lost 0.29 per cent to end at 106.76 points on Monday.
Nearly 31 million shares were exchanged on the northern bourse, worth VNĐ422 billion.
Nguyễn Việt Quang, director of Yuanta Vietnam Securities’ Hà Nội branch, told financial news site ndh.vn that after the earnings season for Q2 passed by, the market would be short of supportive information. This might have certain impacts on investors and cause them to be cautious.
Nguyễn Hoàng Việt, head of market research department at VietinBank Securities Co said in the weeks to come, the VN-Index could easily surpass the 1,000-point mark during the earnings season when listed companies reveal their results for the April-June period and for the first half of 2019.
“But I doubt if the index can sustain at this point level in the context of strong profit-taking pressure and lack of supportive information,” Việt said.
Vietnam’s container throughput surpassed Hong Kong’s in the first half of this year, possibly in part due to trade diversion amid the trade war between China and the US, reported the Chinese news site Caixin Global.
According to the data from Hong Kong Maritime and Port Board, in the first half of 2019, Hong Kong saw a container throughput of 9.06 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs), a year-on-year decrease of 8.1 per cent.
Data from the Vietnam Maritime Administration showed that from January to June, Việt Nam recorded 9.1 million TEUs in container throughput, up 3 per cent compared to the same period last year.
In the first four months of 2019, the total value of Vietnam’s goods exports rose 6.5 per cent year-on-year, according to the General Department of Vietnam Customs.
Việt Nam’s role as a “transfer terminal” contributed largely to the country’s strong export growth, Shen Jianguang, JD Digits’ chief economist, said in a note on Caixin Global.
As of June, Hong Kong had seen year-on-year declines in throughput volume for 17 consecutive months, and saw the sharpest fall of 17.9 per cent in February, Caixin Global reported.
Vietstar Airlines the sixth carrier licensed in Vietnam.
The Civil Aviation Administration of Vietnam (CAAV) has issued an air operator’s certificate (AOC) to the Vietstar Airlines Multirole Corporation (Vietstar Airlines), which will fly Embraer Legacy 600 and Beechcraft King Air B300 aircraft.
From Brazil, the Embraer Legacy 600 competes on the upper end of the small to mid-sized range of business jets and is considered a “Super Midsize”. It will be transformed into a modern business jet by Vietstar, fitted with VIP seats and furniture and with a flying range of up to eight hours. Vietstar Airlines will sign a contract to provide VIP flight services to individuals, organizations, and businesses inside and outside of the country.
The Beechcraft Super King Air B300, meanwhile, is a twin-turboprop aircraft equipped with modern, high-speed propellers and fitted with eight seats. Vietstar Airlines is also looking to purchase additional Legacy 650 aircraft for its future operations.
In addition to general flights, Vietstar Airlines and other businesses within the Vietstar Airlines Multirole Corporation will also provide maintenance services for commercial aircraft and domestic or international medical services (Medivac). It will actively prepare airport infrastructure projects at Tan Son Nhat International Airport in Ho Chi Minh City, Noi Bai International Airport in Hanoi, and Da Nang International Airport. These projects are all in line with the government’s policy of socializing investment in airport infrastructure.
The Vietstar Airlines Multirole Corporation was established by three major shareholders: the Aircraft Repair Company A41 (of the Vietnam People’s Air Force), the Vietstar Aviation JSC, and the Tin Thanh Express JSC.
This is the first airline in Vietnam that is a joint venture between private companies and the national military. The corporation’s goal is to provide passenger and cargo transport within Vietnam, in particular air taxi services for customers with sudden demand. It will also cater to defense requirements, such as military transport and exploration and survey flights.
Other services related to the general aviation industry include maintenance, repair, ground services (both passenger and terminal), cargo services, charter freight, aircraft leasing brokerage, and freight equipment leasing, etc.
There are now six licensed airlines in the domestic aviation market: Vietnam Airlines, Vietjet Air, Jetstar Pacific, Vasco, Bamboo Airways, and Vietstar Airlines.
At least seven people have been killed and two others injured in three traffic accidents which occurred in the northern province of Hai Duong on Tuesday morning.
Five people are killed when a truck overturns in Hai Duong Province on July 23.
Chairman of Kim Thanh District People’s Committee, Vu Dinh Thanh told Dantri/Dtinews that the accidents occurred early this morning on National Highway 5 in Kim Thanh District.
According to police reports, a man was hit dead by a 16-seated passenger bus while cycling on the National Highway 5 running through the district at 4am. Many people including police, the man’s relatives and passers-by gathered at the accident site. At 5am, a truck while trying to avoid another vehicle overturned on the crowd and left at least five people dead and two others injured.
The accidents caused major congestion on the highway.
Police also said that another man was killed after a container truck collided with a truck in Kim Thanh District earlier the same morning.
Budget airline Vietjet and food producer Masan have spent VND387 billion ($16.62 million) on the bonds issued by stock brokerage firm Viet Capital Securities.
Vietjet paid VND350 billion ($15.03 million) and Masan VND37 billion ($1.59 million) for the bonds, which were issued this month. The remaining 23 percent of the bonds were purchased by over 100 local and international investors.
The bonds, with an issue price of VND10 million ($430) each, have a maturity period of two years and a coupon rate of 6-8.2 percent per year.
Viet Capital had said in an earlier note that the bond issue aimed to increase its working capital and restructure debts.
There is a low chance of raising money from banks because stock lending is limited at 5 percent of banks’ equity, the company’s CEO To Hai said in the note, adding that issuing bonds therefore was the best way to increase its capital.
The company’s shareholders had also approved an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) to issue an additional 1.4 million shares.
Viet Capital targets a profit of VND850 billion ($36.54 million) this year, down 17.3 percent from last year.
Shopee, Tiki and Lazada retained their positions as the top three e-commerce platforms in the Vietnamese market in the second quarter of 2019 while Sendo surpassed Thegioididong to become the fourth largest site for the first time.
According to the Map of E-commerce in Viet Nam recently published by market research firm Iprice Insight, Shopee led by traffic with average monthly website visits of nearly 38.59 million.
It was followed by Tiki and Lazada with average monthly website visits of 33.72 million and 28.31 million, respectively.
The quarter saw a change in the fourth and fifth position with Sendo beating Thegioididong to become the fourth largest e-commerce platform by traffic for the first time with average monthly website visits of nearly 28.05 million, compared with 25.35 million of Thegioididong. Sendo’s efforts to deploy technology and improve delivery services were responsible for the impressive advance.
Among the top five e-commerce platforms – Shopee, Tiki, Lazada, Sendo and Thegioididong – in the quarter, Sendo was the only player to see its web traffic grow by more than 10 per cent against the previous quarter, iPrice noted in the release.
Viet Nam’s e-commerce market in the second quarter also saw new player Voso, an e-commerce unit established by local telecom giant Viettel, receiving 211,700 web visits last month, 12 times that of May. Although the site was officially launched earlier this month, Voso has been receiving users since April.
iPrice Insights added that the local market’s performance in the second quarter showed more positive results than in the same period last year. Each player among the 10 most visited platforms saw web traffic slipping by three million visits on a monthly basis in 2018’s second quarter, but this year’s average fall was merely 400,000 visits per month.
This considerable change demonstrates that the local e-commerce market has become more stable and that online consumers not only shop during seasonal sales but also on regular days.
The competition is growing fierce in Viet Nam’s e-commerce market, which is anticipated to reach US$10 billion by 2022.
The ranking was forecast to see significant changes in the last quarter of this year when e-commerce platforms would offer more promotions and discount programmes to stimulate shopping as the year-end approaches.
Iprice Insight is run by iPrice Group, a price comparison platform in seven markets, including Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, the Philippines and Viet Nam.
The worst university majors for jobs were forestry and aquaculture (82.7 percent) and social services (82.3 percent). Meanwhile, the top degree for getting hired right out of university was technology, with 97.3 percent.
More than 97 percent of graduates from technology schools can find good jobs within 12 months after graduation, according to Hoang Cong Dung, deputy director of the Center for Training Support and Manpower Supply, an arm of the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET).
The center, after analyzing reports of 183 universities, concluded that the lowest rate of graduates finding jobs was 80.4 percent (environment related majors).
Some technology schools confirmed that the number of graduates each year are not enough to satisfy demand. Technology firms, which suffer from a labor shortage, have visited schools to recruit third-year and fourth-year students. Some of the firms even sign contracts with schools when they begin enrolling students.
The report cited that more than 10 majors which have high percentage (90 percent or more) of graduates find jobs easily, such as business and management (94.9 percent), architecture and construction (94.6 percent), transportation service (94.4 percent), hotel service, sports and personal services (94.1 percent), and computing and IT (93.9 percent).
The worst university majors for jobs were forestry and aquaculture (82.7 percent) and social services (82.3 percent). Meanwhile, the top degree for getting hired right out of university was technology, with 97.3 percent.
A report released in 2018 by VietnamWorks, the largest job service provider belonging to Navigos Group, named the 10 most wanted majors in the future with information technology leading the majors.
The report showed that the demand for workers in the information technology industry in the last three years increased by 47 percent. This was explained by the fact that the number of firms in the field has increased by 69 percent compared with 2012, while the number of software firms alone has increased by 124 percent.
Meanwhile, the number of workers available has increased by 8 percent per annum only. It is estimated that by 2020, the industry would lack 500,000 workers.
Nguyen Hoang Lan, a student in Hanoi, said she applied for the University of Trade’s e-commerce faculty, though she loves literature.
“At first, I intended to apply for the Hanoi National University’s Literature Faculty. However, my parents wanted me to choose economics. They said social sciences are useless,” she said.
The Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA) reported that nearly 200,000 university graduates stay unemployed, a relatively high figure if compared with the number of university graduates every year.
The meaning of B2B sales is quite simply, the act of businesses selling to other businesses.
Running a productive and profitable sales department depends on having the right employees with the knowledge they need to do their jobs effectively. In order to get the most from your sales team, the members need to be continually updating their selling skills. This is true whether the person is a long-time team member or brand-new to your company.
Once we fully understand the company, their target audience and their customers, we then prepare training that is relevant to their industry and their sales process. All of this is even more important in B2B sales as what works in a retail scenario isn’t always relevant for a company selling to another business.
From other side of a sales person, creating a personal brand can be a daunting, mythical task. And one of the easiest ways to get lost in the process is to not know where to start.
Creating the right personal brand will not only help us be known in our field and consistently land work but it could be the difference between “Who are you?” and “Thank you for being here” in our career.
So, Where in Vietnam do we start?
Steve Sidhu, CEO and Founder at CSS Partners will visit Vietnam and share with us about B2B Sales and Personal Branding, which we should attend. Details as below:
Time: 8:00-11:00, 29th August 2019 Venue: SIHUB, 273 Đien Bien Phu, Ward 7, District 3, HCMC Ticket Fee: 500,000 VND (Professionals) 300,000 VND (Student) Register at the links: https://forms.gle/dcBb3nQ1KAUpE7BA9
B2B Sales in Today’s Business – How to Increase Sales (Starts at 8:30 am to 9:30 am)
This presentation will focus on sales best practices in achieving increased sales. Steve who has over 20+ years of experience in sales will cover many aspects on where sales people have missed the target or overlooked key components in the sale cycle. The speaker will provide practical examples as a take away coupled with different strategies in achieving the desired results. Many professionals view sales as straight forward however there are many aspects and the speakers global experience and the understanding of cultures will aid greatly.
This topic would benefit any beginners or professionals in sales, lead generation, account managers, business development wanting to take sales to the next level.
Personal Branding and You (Starts at 9:45am to 10:45am)
In this presentation our speaker will talk about personal branding and focus on building your brand & creating products to use as lead generators, and build your reputation and visibility. The speaker will pick on some areas where personal brand visibility is essential in focusing who you represent. Today the world now looks at people how they are perceived in social media. Gone are the days where people thought it’s what you know, rather its now people follow you in the digital world.
This topic would benefit anyone wanting to know more on personal branding and who would like to expand their own brand.
About Steve Sidhu. He is based in Tokyo, Japan, born in Australia and an accomplished, award-winning and results-driven global executive who has excelled at creating new business and utilization using powerful networks and proven strategies in sales. His career which spans many years take’s him into assisting local and global companies with global business development expansion, sales and marketing strategies, personal branding, advisory, sales training and coaching. He has considerable experience and demonstrated success in building relationships with top Fortune 1000 CxO management and companies across the globe and delivering results.
Steve will present on two topics on the 29th August from 8am to 11am at Saigon Innovation Hub. His aim is to educate professionals in two high demanding topics that face people today and in their careers that involve being exposed to the professional world and society.
