Breaking the stereotype about programmers
As an excellent student at a top university in Vietnam, Huy was exposed to AI early and participated in international exchange programs. These experiences sparked his passion for AI, motivating him to constantly seek learning opportunities.
Nhat Huy at FPT AI Residency.
Wanting to go further, Huy realized that he needed a solid research foundation, guidance from experienced experts, and a challenging environment to break through. This motivation prompted Huy to participate in an intensive research program, which Huy considered a “turning point in his life”, laying the foundation for important research projects and opening the way to the “territory” of the international scientific community on AI.
Not many programmers in their 20s have the opportunity to set foot in Silicon Valley. “Thanks to this program, I not only learned about AI but also had access to big international problems.” From there, he was able to participate in a collaborative project with Landing AI – a company led by Professor Andrew Ng, one of the pioneers in applying AI technology into practice.
In this project, Huy participated in integrating HyperAgent - an AI assistant capable of automatically generating entire software projects - into Landing AI's vision-agent system. This technology helps shorten the development time of image processing software from weeks to minutes, creating a big step forward in automation and source code optimization.
In addition to his research work, Huy also tried his hand at hackathons in the technology capital of San Francisco and attended international conferences such as the ACM International Conference on Automated Software Engineering. These experiences not only helped him accumulate knowledge but also expanded his network of connections in the global AI community.
“I used to think programming was just about writing code and optimizing algorithms. But when I met the top AI “brains”, I realized that technology is not only a tool but also the key to solving the world's big problems. More importantly, it is also an opportunity to meet outstanding people, learn how they think and create revolutionary products.” – Huy shared about the biggest changes he had after his journey out into the world.
The beginning of reaching out to the world
The program Huy mentioned is FPT AI Residency - where after only 18 months of research, Huy has had 5 scientific articles, of which 3 have been published with a total of 32 citations. He is also filing 2 patents in the US.
Nhat Huy (right) and Dr. Tien Nguyen (left) attend the ASE 2024 Conference.
One of Huy's notable works is RepoHYPER - a semantic search and expansion model of source code on graphs, which helps improve the ability to auto-complete code at the project level. This work is being evaluated at the FORGE conference of ICSE 2025 - an A-ranked conference in the field of Software Engineering.
Not only stopping at theory, Huy also developed practical applications such as VertexVista - a multi-agent library that helps explore code repositories using graphs, which has now been integrated into CodeVista, an application that interacts with the Generative AI system similar to ChatGPT, to improve the understanding of AI assistants writing code at the project level.
In parallel, Huy continued to perfect HyperAgent to open source it, and led an important project in cooperation between Landing AI and FPT.
“Being part of a dedicated research community is a valuable opportunity, where I not only improve my expertise but also meet teachers and friends who share the same passion for AI." – Huy shared. "Each trip, each project not only helps me understand more about technology, but also about myself. I become a better version, nurturing greater aspirations to contribute to affirming Vietnamese intelligence on the global AI map."
With passion, effort and the support of FPT AI Residency, Phan Nhat Huy has had a memorable journey of experience, expanding his worldview, creating important marks in the field of AI. And this is just the beginning of the further goals he is aiming for.
FPT AI Residency is a training program for the young generation in the field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in Vietnam, implemented by FPT since 2021. The program is not only a place to nurture domestic talents but also a launching pad for them to reach international standards. As of 2024, FPT AI Residency has successfully enrolled 5 courses, nurtured more than 75 young talents, published 110 research papers, including 82 papers in leading conferences and journals such as NeurIPS, ICML, ICLR, CVPR, ACL, EMNLP,...
FPT AI Residency is currently enrolling for Course 6. For more information, please visit: https://fpt-aicenter.com/en/ai-residency
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