Skolkovo Residents Pitch to Vietnamese Representatives

July 17, 2020

The Vietnam-Russia business mission, organized jointly by the Skolkovo Foundation and the Russian Export Center, wrapped up today with B2B meetings between Skolkovo residents and Vietnamese companies. The three-day mission took place in online video format, with a Vietnamese market overview on day one, pitch sessions by Skolkovo residents on day two, and B2B meetings on the third and final day.

Country Panorama

The market overview covered areas such as technology, culture, and financial trends, and the country’s successful tackling of the Covid-19 pandemic, leading to one of the lowest incidences of infection in the world.

Vietnam has undergone significant changes over the last thirty years, moving from being a generally closed market to being an open one, and is now one of the favored destinations for foreign manufacturing investment and the manufacture of advanced products. It also has a large population (15th in the world) with 70% at a median age of 30 and a fast-growing urban middle class. While the country lags behind in terms of digitalization, there is a high level of competition in the digitized infrastructure sector. Also, while a high percentage of the population own smartphones, e-commerce is still by and large conducted by means of payment on delivery.

According to one of the speakers, cultural differences with regards to how business is conducted there include the “friendship first, business later” approach combined with a more collectivist and Confucian view. It was also noted that companies seeking to do business there should have an office in the country.

Pitch Sessions

All the pitching companies - Oz Forensics, Brainysoft, SafeTech, VR_Bank, SRG Group, ECOPSY, and QRate - were from the Information Technologies Cluster of the Skolkovo Foundation and each were given seven minutes to pitch their products. The product areas included biometrics identification technology, software for automating financial companies’ activities, innovative solutions for protecting distance banking and electronic document flow systems, individual payment solutions in e-commerce, quantum cryptography, etc. These offered more efficient and secure solutions as well as technology that will become crucial in the coming five to ten years for companies seeking to improve security.

Over a dozen Vietnamese banks attended the pitch sessions; among these were HD Bank, BIDV, VietCapital bank, Vietnam Posts and Telecommunications Group, Data Communication of Vietnam (DCV), T&T Group, FE credit, Finviet, PVCOM as well as others.

https://sk.ru/news/skolkovo-residents-pitch-to-vietnamese-representatives/