Ms. Duong Tuong Nhi, Head of Design Thinking Village, Techfest Vietnam: Bold steps will create the path
From zero in the innovation industry, up to now, Ms. Duong Tuong Nhi has always been enthusiastic in contributing to building an innovative startup ecosystem with Techfest Vietnam.
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| Ms. Duong Tuong Nhi, Head of Design Thinking Village, Techfest Vietnam |
Always curious about the unknown
Before entering Techfest Vietnam - the country's largest innovation and startup competition and event with the mission of supporting the "Innovation and Startup Ecosystem" (Project 844/QD-TTg), Ms. Duong Tuong Nhi was the Founder and CEO of Happy Lifestyle Company Limited. This is a company specializing in providing courses and training on changing awareness, attitudes..., as a foundation to create sustainable businesses and happy lifestyles.
Ms. Nhi admitted that at that time, her knowledge of this field was zero. “Innovation, ecosystem… were words that I heard a lot, but there was a big gap between knowing and understanding deeply. Only when I started doing it, did I realize that I understood nothing,” Ms. Nhi shared.
The businesswoman said that at the beginning, she discussed and chatted with other technology village leaders, and with the leaders of the National Innovation and Startup Ecosystem Support Project until 2025, but sometimes, after the discussion, she still did not understand anything.
However, it was this lack of understanding that stimulated her curiosity. The businesswoman spent time attending seminars, talks, and events on startups and innovation; and talking with leaders, village chiefs, experts, etc. across the country.
“I always listen to the sharing and experience of experts at events from beginning to end, absorbing every word they say. And the biggest opportunity is the book “Rainforest” written about the early days of Silicon Valley. I learned a lot from this book and thanks to it, I know where to start to build a strong startup ecosystem, to contribute to bringing the country to the forefront of technology 4.0”, Ms. Nhi recalls.
But just listening, learning and reading is not enough. She implemented and acted on what she learned as soon as possible to experience and learn from it. According to her, innovation lies first and foremost in the spirit of pioneering, not being afraid of making mistakes, and if you make a mistake, then do it again. Design thinking has 5 steps: understand, define, create, prototype and test, but it is not necessary to always go from 1 to 5. Sometimes, you can go to step 3, then go back to the first step to adjust.
The key to innovation
Design Thinking Village was established with the goal of creating an environment that promotes members of the startup ecosystem, businesses, researchers, investors, etc. to have more inspiration and connections in design thinking.
Starting a business and innovating is doing something very new, something no one has done yet, like going into a forest without a path, you have to find your own way so that there is a path for others to follow and start a business. If you are afraid of getting lost, you will not dare to do anything, you will not be creative anymore. 
- Mrs. Duong Tuong Nhi
According to the definition of design thinking, understanding human behavior is the key to innovation. Design thinking is a process to achieve innovation by focusing on customer needs, with human as the center.
She gave an example of the success of technology taxis compared to traditional taxis. Before, when there were no technology taxis, we had to call the hotline to book a car and customers could not know where the taxi had gone... During the process of using the service, if there was something bad, there was no way to give feedback. But technology taxi companies have not only improved all of that, but also integrated many other services and utilities, such as food delivery, diverse payment methods...
“It can be said that understanding customers helps technology car companies achieve success in the market,” said Ms. Nhi.
Not only understanding, to successfully apply design thinking, it is also necessary to identify ideas, create creative solutions that meet the great needs of the market, test, collect feedback and continuously adjust to always have the most creative products. This is more evident in technology products such as social networking applications and storage applications. For example, YouTube allows everyone to use it for free, creates great demand when they have a habit, then sells YouTube Premium for an ad-free experience.
“The developer has created demand for the customer himself thanks to design thinking,” said Ms. Nhi. This thinking can also be flexibly applied to innovate and create better efficiency in many other activities outside of business.
Within the framework of the Design Thinking Village, Ms. Duong Tuong Nhi has built the Rainforest ecosystem to support and connect the Vietnamese startup and innovation community. However, to better understand this ecosystem, you need to read the book of the same name.
So in this project, individuals in the ecosystem are encouraged to read part, parts, or the entire book and record it. The recordings are then compiled into multiple audiobooks. The project also offers incentives for individuals to participate, to motivate them to spread the message about Rainforests.
“If we do nothing, few people will read. Therefore, I create many activities to encourage and motivate them to pick up the book. Maybe they will only read one chapter, but from there, it will stimulate curiosity and desire to learn more about this ecosystem. Design thinking is not only applied in business,” Ms. Nhi shared.
Up to now, the Rainforest project has completed the audiobook version so that everyone can access it more easily. In addition, the Head of Design Thinking Village also created many activities such as co-creation through team building Rainforest Canvas, talkshows... within the framework of the Rainforest project to encourage everyone to participate.
In order to spread design thinking more widely, up to now, Design Thinking Village has implemented many programs such as MegaCity Connect, Regional Caravan, Design Thinking Open Innovation competition, Rainforest Project...
The main focus in 2024 is the Vietnam Innovation Talent Competition, with the aim of finding pioneering leaders to solve social and local problems. At the same time, attracting diverse resources and participation from corporations, investors, government organizations, departments, and sectors in many fields, thereby creating a successful, creative, and sustainable ecosystem.
Rainforest Ecosystem Creation
Explaining the name of the Rainforest ecosystem, Ms. Nhi said that in the natural forest ecosystem, sometimes new types of trees will appear that no one knows about. But after testing and finding valuable values, these types of trees are named and gradually become popular.
The same goes for the economic ecosystem, startups, and innovation. Somewhere a startup or innovation business will appear. For these businesses to become well-known companies, there needs to be an entire ecosystem to support them. There, there are investors, there is a network of experts… ready to help. In such a good environment, businesses, startup projects, and innovation can develop.
The book “Rainforest” also gives examples of big names like Google and Facebook. If these start-ups were not in Silicon Valley, and were not supported by the entire ecosystem, then no one would know about them.
In the Rainforest ecosystem, in the extensive connection with all components of the economy, startups, innovation, such as large enterprises, experts, investors..., startups receive free sharing, enthusiastic support from the entire ecosystem. "There are famous experts willing to spend time to help startups, help people in need. That is the giving of the ecosystem", Ms. Nhi shared.
Ms. Nhi and the Design Thinking Village will also have many support programs on training, information sharing, connecting investors with startups, financial support... within their capabilities. Up to now, there have been many training programs from leading experts organized by the Design Thinking Village for businesses, such as training on legal responsibilities of managers and internal dispute resolution shared by lawyer Dao Tien Phong, Executive Lawyer of Innvestpush Global; a discussion on intellectual property in global trade and its application to the context of Vietnam shared by Associate Professor, Dr. Dinh Diep Cong Thanh, Director of the Center for Intellectual Property and Technology Transfer...
In addition, the Village also organizes the Design Thinking Open Innovation Competition with both start-up and student panels, aiming to attract innovative ideas in startups, business, commercialize those ideas, connect intellectual resources and feasible solutions from experts to solve social problems.
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