The GenZ students at the heart of Vietnam’s chip plans
Nguyen Phuong Linh is among a crop of young electronics students crucial to Vietnam’s ambitions to become a chips hub.
She’s driven, smart and already has her sights set on a professorship — wanting to train a new generation that could help attract foreign investors eager to diversify semiconductor production away from China and Taiwan.
Long viewed as a lowcost destination to make clothes, shoes and furniture, Vietnam is now eyeing a rapid climb up the global supply chain and has put computer chips at the heart of its development plans.
It is a goal that suits nations such as the United States — increasingly worried about economic tensions with Beijing — but there are huge hurdles to overcome, chiefly a shortage of engineers.
“Chips are attracting so much attention... among both the government and the public,” Ms. Linh said from the lab at Hanoi’s University of Science and Technology.
“I used to dream of working as a chip designer but now I want to be a professor. I think our country needs more teachers to create a better workforce,” the 21yearold said. highly
Growth expected
skilled
Vietnam’s market for semiconductors, which are used in everything from smartphones to satellites and to power AI technology, is expected to grow at 6.5% a year, reaching $7 billion by 2028, according to Technavio, a market research firm.
During a visit to the capital last year, U.S. President Joe Biden announced deals to support Vietnam’s chips industry, and shortly after, Nvidia — an American giant in the sector — said it wanted to set up a base in the country.
South Korea’s Amkor and Hana Micron both opened packaging factories last year in Vietnam, which is already home to the U.S. firm Intel’s largest factory for assembling, packaging, and testing chips.
As the hype around Vietnam’s emerging chips industry ramps up, its communist government has said the country’s current pool of around 5,000 semiconductor engineers must jump to 20,000 in the next five years — and to 50,000 over the next decade.
The govt. has said the current pool of 5,000 semiconductor engineers must jump to 20,000 in the next five years in Vietnam