Vietnam’s training expertise (edtech) market has proven sturdy development partially because of the pandemic, which pushed on-line studying in addition to the patron’s urge for food for added studying.
Vietnam has a inhabitants of 98 million, of which round 70 p.c are beneath 35 years of age. Presently, it has about 17.5 million college students at main and secondary training ranges, with roughly 1.7 million college students enrolled in universities.
Edtech market overview: A primer
Edtech is the mix of training and expertise utilizing technological instruments to facilitate training. It makes use of IT instruments to boost the person studying expertise.
The Vietnamese edtech market is estimated to exceed US$3 billion by 2023. In response to Tracxn Applied sciences, there are about 260 edtech companies in Vietnam, most are start-ups and enterprise to shopper (B2C) companies.
Edtech startups are luring the curiosity of each native and overseas enterprise capital funds as they create new enterprise fashions to faucet into the web scholar shopper market. Funding offers in edtech had been estimated to succeed in US$45 million in 2020. South Korea, the US, and Singapore are among the many prime traders out there.
In Vietnam, edtech firms deal with three principal areas equivalent to digital content material, studying administration programs (LMS), and integrating superior applied sciences equivalent to augmented actuality (AR), digital actuality (VR), and synthetic intelligence (AI).
The digital content material market is crowded with service suppliers providing numerous merchandise, equivalent to English language topics and game-based studying content material for early childhood training, take a look at preparation, self-study choices, e-books, and tutoring service searches for basic training. A notable overseas participant on this section is Snapask, a Hong Kong-based startup which entered Vietnam in 2020 and gives a tutoring app for college kids in training.
There are additionally a number of English educating merchandise for college kids and adults, equivalent to Elsa or Duolingo. Some native edtech firms have additionally tried to diversify their product content material to different talent growth areas equivalent to Arithmetic.
This aligns properly with the rising need of Vietnamese mother and father for his or her kids to develop STEM abilities. CoderSchool, a startup offering on-line coaching in programming, has just lately introduced that it has raised US$2.6 million in a Pre-Collection A funding spherical led by Monk’s Hill Ventures.
The edtech marketplace for digital content material in Vietnam has additionally attracted overseas edtech teams within the rising pattern of using digital content material by native faculties. They’ve managed to entry the market by way of their native gross sales brokers which have sturdy relationships with training authorities.
Some functions broadly utilized in Vietnam embrace Quiver 3D Coloring in early childhood training and Merge Dice, a digital platform that helps college students study science and STEM successfully with 3D objects and simulations. Non-public college operation EQuest Training Group and AI-powered Clevai secured funding from Singapore and the US.
Other than digital content material provision, edtech companies additionally present LMS platforms starting from college administration, educating and studying innovation, to tutoring and evaluation providers, and so forth. Notable firms offering this answer in Vietnam are Wewiin, Ai Vietnam, and Topica Group.
There are 237 universities in Vietnam of which 22 at the moment ship distance studying applications, with e-learning as one of many supply modes. Nonetheless, not all establishments have their very own, in-house-developed platform for e-learning applications.
Some universities that can’t afford their very own LMS platform choose to companion with corporations like Topica Group. The group owns a cyber college that delivers bachelor applications utilizing Topica’s platform, with technical and tutorial assist offered for learners.
Native start-up and home tech firms additionally provide options incorporating AR/VR or AI applied sciences. FPT, a prime supplier of IT providers in Vietnam, has developed an app utilizing AI to ship a studying expertise tailor-made to every scholar’s strengths and weaknesses.
Geniebook from Singapore presents a set of on-line studying options for main to secondary college college students that features signature AI-personalized worksheets and reside courses. In the meantime, there are additionally some overseas suppliers integrating AR/VR applied sciences equivalent to CO-WELL Asia (Japan) and Hiverlab (Singapore).
Alternatives for overseas traders
Vietnam has vital potential for edtech market growth. Key development drivers embrace a excessive price of web customers at 70 p.c of the nation’s inhabitants and a tech-savvy group, accompanied by the rising demand for multimedia content material, in addition to studying choices which might be low-cost and time-efficient.
As well as, the training sector performs an essential half within the digital transformation agenda of the Vietnamese authorities; subsequently it’s strongly supported by all key stakeholder teams, together with policymakers, academic managers, lecturers, academics, and college students.
Accelerated by the pandemic, a number of edtech firms have been experiencing sturdy development, however there isn’t a dominant participant within the native market. Consultants say that Vietnamese edtech corporations nonetheless lack breakthrough applied sciences to develop stronger. This presents enticing alternatives for traders to have a look at.
Greater training and vocational coaching
Blended studying has gained reputation and has turn out to be an efficient device in Vietnam because the nation adapts to the brand new regular of dwelling with the pandemic. By combining conventional face-to-face educating and e-learning with computer-mediated assist, this hybrid technique is predicted to realize greater effectivity.
As many Vietnamese educators shift in the direction of this training technique, blended studying presents alternatives for Vietnamese companies to companion with overseas traders; native companions can play the function of a recruiting hub whereas assessing the market.
An initiative collaboration on this section has been the undergraduate diploma in ICT collectively delivered by Swinburne College of Know-how (Australia) and FPT College (Vietnam). The blended studying expertise was based mostly on the courseware and the ICT system by Swinburne, whereas FPT College would supply mentors and different studying assist, in addition to advertising and marketing the programs regionally and administering admissions and enrollment.
Relating to vocational training and coaching (VET), partnerships with vocational faculties which have been acknowledged as high-quality establishments, and have a long-term imaginative and prescient on talent growth, might present an entry level for exploring new collaboration for on-line VET supply. Overseas companies and Vietnamese companions may discover collaboration within the supply of micro-credentials or mini-qualifications acknowledged by industries, equivalent to tourism and hospitality, IT, design, and communication.
Early childhood training
The early childhood training sector is a distinct segment market in Vietnam, which presents potential enterprise alternatives in personal kindergartens responding to the Authorities’s strategic sector growth plan.
Alternatives for edtech companies on this section embrace designing digital content material for youngsters to study a overseas language in addition to elementary delicate abilities, trainer coaching options offered on digital platforms, or sharing expertise {and professional} experience in curriculum growth, high quality assurance, and managing digital agenda implementation at an institutional degree.
Not too long ago, Japanese Gakken Holdings has partnered with Vietnamese edtech firm KiddiHub Training Know-how, an data supplier for kindergartens. Gakken is planning to make use of KiddiHub’s established on-line presence to advertise non-cognitive studying that focuses on important considering abilities.
Basic training
The Vietnamese authorities has undertaken vital training system reforms, in search of to deliver Vietnam’s high quality of human assets in training to worldwide requirements. Basic training has undergone super reform in all areas just lately. Particularly, the nation has a brand new basic training program related to fundamental modifications in scholar evaluation strategies, educating strategies and supplies, and modifications in standards for trainer evaluation.
For example, a brand new competency-based curriculum has changed standard supply based mostly on a single set of textbooks and tried to combine STEM/STEAM into the curriculum has put a robust emphasis on modern supply modes and strategies.
On this section, potential enterprise alternatives for edtech companions embrace digital content material, significantly in STEM/STEAM topics, e-textbook, trainer coaching, and evaluation merchandise, significantly for English language coaching.
E-learning in company coaching
Vietnam’s e-learning market additionally presents the potential for on-line coaching merchandise for enterprise prospects. There’s a rising demand for using LMS to combine standard in-house company coaching processes that successfully ship to giant numbers of employees in Vietnam. Examples embrace state-owned Vietnam Electrical energy (EVN) and Vietcombank which have arrange their very own e-learning facilities to be able to obtain efficient human useful resource growth. Potential industries are banking, tourism, and hospitality.
Market entry methods in edtech
To capitalize on the total potential of the edtech market in Vietnam, overseas edtech suppliers must navigate present challenges, such because the regulatory panorama for establishing and working an edtech entity in Vietnam.
Edtech stays a obscure space beneath the Vietnamese authorized framework because it has not been explicitly laid out in authorized paperwork. Buyers who search to undertake edtech associated enterprise actions ought to evaluate the necessities on a case-by-case foundation.
Related legal guidelines governing overseas funding in edtech embrace the Regulation on Funding, the Regulation on Training, Industrial Regulation, in addition to various decrees and circulars regulating particular actions.
These embrace Decree 86/2018/ND-CP on overseas cooperation and funding within the academic sector, Round 21/2018/TT-BGDDT on group and operation of overseas language and IT facilities, and Decree 09/2018/ND-CP on the sale of products by overseas traders and foreign-invested enterprise entities in Vietnam.
The Vietnamese authorities has acknowledged sure inconsistencies within the authorized framework regulating edtech and is thus is engaged on a draft round that gives unified steering on E-learning actions.
For now, traders are required to fulfill numerous funding situations and procure related sub-licenses to function in Vietnam, relying on particular edtech actions and enterprise fashions. On the whole, overseas traders in edtech should register their enterprise traces to cowl some or the entire following:
- Instructional actions;
- Technological actions; and
- Buying and selling actions.
For academic actions, traders are allowed to kind 100% overseas training entities equivalent to short-term coaching establishments, pre-schools, obligatory training establishments, greater academic establishments, and department campuses of foreign-invested greater training establishments, with situations on minimal capital utilized.
Registering for buying and selling actions with the Ministry of Business and Commerce (MoIT) is required if firms distribute on-line programs with curriculum or applications developed by one other occasion or present an e-commerce platform for training.
Whereas training and buying and selling are conditional for overseas traders, ICT is among the inspired particular funding sectors by the Vietnamese authorities. Upon registration for IT and pc programming actions, edtech firms are entitled to a company earnings tax exemption for as much as 4 years, adopted by a 50 p.c tax discount for as much as 9 years.
Subsequently, a preferential CIT price of is utilized (in comparison with the normal 20 p.c for a interval of 15 years). Additional, there’s additionally a privileged coverage for employees employed within the IT sector, together with a 50 p.c discount in private earnings tax.
Overseas edtech companies also can think about getting into the Vietnamese market by collaborating with an area companion to keep away from advanced setup procedures. Potential companions for overseas traders may be an training entity, a expertise agency, or an area gross sales agent. Working with an area companion may be useful as they’ll assist improve market entry and strengthen overseas manufacturers’ footprint in Vietnam through their native expertise and extensive community with home stakeholders.
About Us
Vietnam Briefing is produced by Dezan Shira & Associates. The agency assists overseas traders all through Asia from places of work the world over, together with in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh Metropolis, and Da Nang. Readers might write to vietnam@dezshira.com for extra assist on doing enterprise in Vietnam.
We additionally keep places of work or have alliance companions helping overseas traders in Indonesia, India, Singapore, The Philippines, Malaysia, Thailand, Italy, Germany, and the United States, along with practices in Bangladesh and Russia.
