Vietnamese businesses ‘from outsourcing to co-creation’ with Japan

“We don’t want to just be a outsourcing partner. We want to be a co-creator to join Japan in solving future challenges,” Mr. Le Quang Luong, Chairman of Vinasa’s Vietnam – Japan Information Technology Cooperation Committee, said at the Japan ICT Day 2026 event on February 4 in Hanoi.

As a representative for digital technology businesses at the association, according to Mr. Luong, Vietnam – Japan IT cooperation is entering an “important turning point”, in the context that Japan faces challenges in digital competitiveness and a shortage of about 800,000 engineers by 2030. Meanwhile, Vietnam also has big goals of maintaining rapid and continuous economic growth. In addition, the explosion of AI technology is creating comprehensive changes in business cooperation models between technology enterprises of the two countries.

Japanese businesses’ confidence in the Vietnamese market is considered to be still solid. According to a 2024 survey by the Japan Trade Promotion Organization JETRO, 56.1% of Japanese businesses in Vietnam plan to expand their business in the next 1-2 years, the highest rate in ASEAN.

Sharing the same opinion, Mr. Tran Anh Tu, Deputy Director of Information Technology Industry – Ministry of Science and Technology, assessed Japan as a particularly important partner of Vietnam, not only because of investment scale or technology level, but because they have the same long-term development philosophy, valuing quality, discipline, governance and sustainable development.

“Vietnam wants to cooperate with Japan not only to do things faster or cheaper, but to do things better, deeper and longer term,” Mr. Tu said.

Summing up the cooperation process between the two sides, the Department’s representative assessed that from the initial outsourcing cooperation models, the two sides gradually expanded to stages with higher added value, such as jointly raising quality standards, perfecting the process, participating in solution design and co-developing products in practical digital transformation projects. This also helps Vietnamese technology enterprises gradually meet the strict standards of the Japanese market and participate more deeply in the global technology value chain.

According to the Department of Information Technology Industry, Vietnam – Japan technology cooperation is said to be and will be shifting from the model of “hiring work” to “working together” and from “receiving transfer” to participating in mastering technology, especially in strategic fields such as artificial intelligence, semiconductor industry, big data, digital platforms, smart manufacturing and green production.

“Vietnam today is no longer just a low-cost outsourcing destination. We are gradually shifting to the role of co-creation partner in the global technology value chain,” Mr. Tran Anh Tu said, emphasizing that Vietnam has young technology human resources who learn quickly, adapt quickly, the business community increasingly masters solution design, product development and deployment of complex technology systems, and is a large enough market to test, perfect and expand models. new technology.

At the event, Vinasa representatives proposed three action strategies for the Vietnam – Japan digital technology business community. First, move from an HR outsourcing model to a GenAI-based productivity partner that provides solutions to modernize systems and sell results instead of man-hours. Second, exploit the digital transformation market right in Vietnam. Third, promote two-way human resource exchange, turning Vietnam into a technology training and experience center for engineers from the two countries.

In addition, an initiative in 2026 is to form joint ventures between Japanese businesses – owning the brand and source technology, and Vietnamese businesses – owning the deployment capacity and speed. This alliance aims to jointly conquer large-scale projects in third markets such as ASEAN, the US, and Europe.

According to Mr. Haruhiko Ozasa, chief representative of JETRO Hanoi, to promote international open innovation between Japanese companies and foreign startups, this unit has launched the J-Bridge business platform, promoting the establishment of partnerships, including business and technology alliances. They also update information daily about Vietnamese startups interested in collaborating with Japanese companies.

“As technologically advanced and innovative Vietnamese companies develop in the future, Japanese companies will have more reliable partners to cooperate with,” Mr. Haruhiko said.

Japan ICT Day is an annual event held since 2007, becoming an effective technology promotion platform between the two countries. This year’s event had the participation of many leaders of ministries, branches, Japanese embassies in Vietnam, associations, and technology corporations and large manufacturing enterprises of Vietnam and Japan.