VietNamNet introduces the speech of Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung at the working session of Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha with 2 National Universities in Ho Chi Minh City on September 6, 2023.

Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung: The Ministry of Information and Communications will support universities by creating demand for digital human resources through promoting digital transformation, developing the semiconductor industry; and promoting CNS enterprises to go abroad. Photo: Hoang Giam

Firstly, our demand for human resources in IT and CNS is 150,000 engineers/year. Currently, we only meet 40-50%. The demand for human resources in the semiconductor industry is 5-10,000 engineers/year. Currently, we only meet less than 20% of the demand. The two national universities should consider this as both a market and a national responsibility for training digital human resources.

"Vietnamese people are good at studying and hard-working, very suitable for chip design, and will consider this as a core strength." - Minister Nguyen Manh Hung

The second is about the development of the semiconductor industry. The Ministry of Information and Communications is preparing to submit to the Government the National Strategy on the development of the semiconductor industry. Some orientations are: Vietnam will go in an ecosystem, not go alone; combine FDI (but attract high value-added stages) and Vietnam will be self-reliant in some stages in the semiconductor industry chain (design, testing, packaging); combine semiconductor and microchip development and electronic equipment development, especially IoT; the strength of Vietnamese people is Vietnamese people, Vietnamese people are good at studying and studious, very suitable for chip design, and this will be considered a key strength; the important infrastructure that the state needs to invest in for the development of the semiconductor industry is the system of leading laboratories and assign universities to operate and exploit. The two national universities will take on national responsibility for training high-quality human resources for the semiconductor and microchip industries.

The important infrastructure that the State needs to invest in for the development of the semiconductor industry is a system of leading laboratories and assign them to universities to operate and exploit.

Third, CNS, especially AI, has passed the research and discovery stage and entered the application and practice stage. The discovery stage requires the elite. The application stage requires many application engineers. The application stage is also the stage that brings the most value to a country, especially a developing country like ours. We need a lot of application-level CNS engineers to accelerate the process of national digital transformation, industrialization and modernization of the country. Perhaps digital universities and retraining are the solution to the huge demand for digital human resources today. The government should have a strong policy on digital universities.

'The application phase requires many engineers. This is also the phase that brings the most value to a country, especially a developing country like ours." - Minister Nguyen Manh Hung

Fourth, a sustainable university needs an appropriate revenue structure. Tuition fees, if large, should only account for 60-70%. The rest should come from research, assets and support sources. It is recommended that the Government consider and review mechanisms to increase revenue from research and university assets. For example, the Government should order more from universities than from national research, and allow businesses to operate on some university assets.

Fifth, the Ministry of Information and Communications can support universities as follows:

1)- Issue annual reports on human resource needs and use of IT and CNS human resources. And send this report to the university.

2)- Create demand for digital human resources through promoting digital transformation, developing the semiconductor industry, then supporting and promoting CNS enterprises to go abroad to conquer the global market, turning Vietnam into a global digital transformation center. Many Vietnamese CNS enterprises have revenue from foreign markets: Viettel has revenue from abroad of over 3 billion USD, FPT has over 1 billion USD, enterprises with revenue from abroad of hundreds of millions of USD are quite a lot. This will create demand for highly paid CNS human resources for universities.

"The government orders universities to do more national research, allowing businesses to do business on some university assets." - Minister Nguyen Manh Hung

3)- Create connections between tens of thousands of CNS enterprises and universities. Call on a number of large CNS enterprises to invest in R&D centers of national universities.

4)- Propose to the Government some pilot policies on developing CNS at universities. For example, the State invests in modern national laboratories on CNS and then hands them over to universities to operate. Modern laboratories will be an important magnet to attract research to universities.

Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Manh Hung

Vietnamnet.vn