Korean IT companies are making investments in Vietnam by hiring talent through local subsidiaries or establishing new data centers. On the back of the bilateral summit in Aug., they are diving into one of Vietnam's national projects: digital transformation.
According to the industry on the 22nd, Naver is recently hiring new staff locally in Vietnam. According to itviec, a Vietnamese IT recruitment platform, Naver Vietnam (NAVER Vietnam) has posted job openings for a range of roles from interns to frontier engineers, Android engineers, back-end engineers, and product managers (PM). Naver Vietnam has received favorable reviews on itviec, recording a rating of 4.8 out of 5 from current employees. Earlier, after entering Vietnam in 2015, Naver continued to invest by launching the internet broadcasting platform "V Live (now HYBE "Weverse")" locally and establishing a development center.
◇ Vietnam's ICT industry grows with Smart City as a national project
Vietnam has strong growth potential in the information and communications technology (ICT) industry. With an average age of 32.5 and a large youth population, Vietnam has a high internet penetration rate of 93%. The Vietnamese government is also promoting the construction of a Smart City centered on the capital, Hanoi, as a national project. According to Statista, Vietnam's Smart City market size is about $206.9 million (297.62565 billion won) as of 2024, up about 47.5% from 2021. From 2025 to 2029, it is expected to grow at an average annual rate of 12.55%.
In particular, Korea and Vietnam pledged to cooperate in Vietnam in artificial intelligence (AI), Smart City, and digital infrastructure on the occasion of the bilateral summit in Aug. The two countries agreed to expand cooperation in future-oriented fields such as advanced technology, energy, and supply chains, while growing trade from $86.7 billion (120 trillion won) last year to $150 billion (208 trillion won) by 2030.
◇ Building data centers and cooperating on AX… "Korean companies can preempt the local market"
Not only Naver but other IT companies are also focusing on Vietnam's growth potential. SK Telecom, together with SK Innovation, also plans to promote the construction of an AI DC (artificial intelligence data center) in Vietnam. SK Telecom is expected to expand into Malaysia, Singapore, and beyond by linking with group affiliates' businesses with Vietnam as a base. SK Telecom President Jung Jai-hun said at the SK AI Summit earlier this month, "We will move into the Asian market based on our AI data center construction capabilities accumulated at home."
In the case of KT, it formed a strategic collaboration with Viettel Group, the largest local telecom operator, in Aug. Viettel Group is a leading Vietnamese IT company that provides services to 138 million customers in 11 countries across Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The two companies plan to cooperate on local artificial intelligence transformation (AX), including jointly developing a "national general-purpose AI language model" to be used in Vietnam.
The Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA) Hanoi office said, "Vietnam has made Smart City a national strategic task and is accelerating digital transformation across cities. This policy-driven momentum goes beyond simple infrastructure expansion and signifies a reorganization of the entire urban operating system, including administration, transportation, energy, and the environment," adding, "If Korean corporations enter the market, they can secure a strategic position as problem-solving technology and service providers and co-planners, moving away from a supplier perspective focused on short-term orders."