Việt Nam and the chipmaker Nvidia have signed an agreement to establish an artificial intelligence (AI) research and development centre in the country. VNA/VNS Photo

HÀ NỘI — A recent agreement reached between Việt Nam and the US chipmaker Nvidia to establish an artificial intelligence (AI) research and development centre in the country marks a significant step forward in Việt Nam’s plans to turn itself into a regional tech hub, commented the current-affairs magazine The Diplomat in a recent article.

According to the article, the agreement will involve the expansion of an AI data centre owned by the Vietnamese military-owned Viettel Group, which already uses Nvidia technology. Nvidia also said it has acquired healthcare startup VinBrain, a unit of the prominent Vietnamese conglomerate Vingroup.

In a statement released after the signing of the deal, Nvidia expressed “confidence in the country’s bright artificial intelligence future.” Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang was quoted in the statement as praising Vietnam’s “vibrant ecosystem of researchers, startups, and enterprise organisations.”

The article recalled that visiting Hà Nội late last year, Huang said that his firm was committed to investing in Việt Nam and making the country its “second home.” In particular, it said it planned to expand its partnerships with Việt Nam’s top tech firms and support the country in training talent for developing AI and digital infrastructure.

Last year, Nvidia began collaborating with FPT Smart Cloud – its first Vietnamese cloud partner. In April, FPT announced that it and Nvidia would build a US$200 million AI “factory” using Nvidia’s graphic chip and software.

All of these activities are part of Nvidia’s broader push into Southeast Asia, where demand for data services has surged on the back of its exploding digital economy. According to a recent report, this was worth $263 billion in 2023, up from just $31 billion in 2015, it noted.

This focus reflects the growing importance to foreign tech firms of Southeast Asia, a region with a young, upwardly-mobile, and tech-savvy population, as both a manufacturing hub and a market for tech products.

This year, the CEOs of the US tech giants Apple and Microsoft also made tours of Southeast Asia, announcing billions of US dollars in investments, particularly in data centres designed to support the expansion of AI services, the article notes. — VNS