Hanoi Times – Vietnam is welcoming a new wave of investment into its IT industry but human resources are far too limited.

Opportunity abound

“Vietnam has a great opportunity to develop its IT industry,” confirmed Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhat at a workshop o­n information and communication training held in Da Nang o­n January 10.

Five international groups, including Intel, Renesas, Campal, Samsung and Foxcon, have decided to invest nearly US$ 10 billion in designing and manufacturing chipsets, computers, cell phones and telecom equipment in Vietnam. By 2010, the total revenue from these groups alone is expected to hit US$ 30 billion.

Since 2006, IBM Vietnam’s need for software engineers increased ten fold. Havey Nash, a British company which came to the country in 2001, is now using 1,500 software engineers. Boeing is seeking its partner in Vietnam and it needs at least 1,000.

Taiwan’s Foxcon, a major producer of computer and hand phone components, telecom services, electronics, etc. will invest US$ 5 billion and needs more than 50,000 workers.

Another Taiwanese investor, Campal, a laptop and telecom equipment manufacturer, initially invested US$ 500 million in Vietnam and is recruiting 1,200 engineers, to be trained abroad.

Pham Tan Cong, Secretary General of the Vietnam Software Association (Vinasa), said according to a survey conducted by Kearney, a US company, Vietnam ranks 20th of 25th most attractive nations for outsourcing. Vietnam was Japan’s fourth biggest outsourcer in 2006 and first in 2007.

Cong says a British group is ready to welcome all Vietnamese software engineers to Europe, o­n the condition that their English is sufficient.

Crisis!

According to Deputy Minister of Education and Training Banh Tien Long, investors’ biggest worry is seeking enough qualified staff in Vietnam at low enough prices.

It is absurd that while ICT companies are seriously in need of qualified workers, thousands of newly graduated students are unemployed because they don’t meet employers’ requirements.

To operate its $1 billion project in HCM City, Intel needs around 1,000 engineers in the fields of electronics, IT and automation. The company tested nearly 2,000 students last year and o­nly 90 met Intel’s criteria.

Japan’s Renesas, o­ne of the world leaders in designing and manufacturing chipsets, built a design center in HCM City in 2007. Renesas needs around 1,000 transistor designers; over the past two years, the firm needed 500 engineers for the first phase of its operation and from 1,000 applicants, it selected just 60.

According to the Ministry of Information and Communications, Vietnam has a handful of excellent IT experts who are able to be advisors or design big systems and comprehensive solutions but is in serious shortage of ICT workers who have good English and professional skills.

Vicious circle

Vinasa Secretary General Pham Tan Cong said it is necessary to reverse the vicious education cycle (collecting low school fees – investing too little in training activities – low training quality – poor employment opportunities) and for businesses (low human resource quality – aiming at small markets - signing low-value contracts – earning low profit – paying low salary).

Cong says these problems must be fixed through specific measures (collecting high school fees – investing a lot in training – providing high-quality training courses – creating high-quality human resources – high-paid employment opportunities) and businesses (recruiting high-quality staff – aiming at international markets – signing high-value contracts – earning high profit – paying high salaries).

He said the Government should encourage investment in private IT universities and colleges, which provide international standard training courses and have good relationships with business to facilitate the process from learner to worker.

Minister of Information and Communications Le Doan Hop said from now to 2010, the Ministry will focus o­n training high-quality human resources, especially IT managers.

“Low labor cost is an advantage of the Vietnamese workforce, but if Vietnamese workers are unskilled and don’t meet investors’ needs, we will lose the chance to attract foreign investment and speed up IT development over the next 20 years,” asserted Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan.

Ten universities, colleges and 31 companies signed cooperation agreements o­n cooperation in training and using IT human resources.

The Ministry of Education and Training and the Ministry of Information and Communications signed an agreement to develop a national training network to facilitate education reforms and assist teachers and students with access to updated information sources across the world.