Taiwanese Exec. Leads Alliance To Help Vietnam's Factories Go Digital

TaiwanPlus News

Taiwanese executive Kenneth Chen is leading an alliance of tech advocates in Taiwan and Vietnam to help traditional factories go digital.

Transcript

00:00All this week on Taiwan Plus, we've been looking at how Taiwanese firms in Vietnam

00:04are pushing their operations to be a leader in that country's digital transformation.

00:08Joyce Sun spent a week in Ho Chi Minh City and joins us now in the studio.

00:11Hey Eric, that's right, we've been looking at how Taiwanese factories are trying to lead

00:17an upgrade of Vietnam's manufacturing sector.

00:20Now Taiwan is globally known as a high-tech powerhouse,

00:23but bringing cutting-edge tools into a factory setting,

00:26especially overseas, comes with many challenges.

00:29Now the reality for many factories in Vietnam right now

00:32is that they're just not set up to go digital,

00:35let alone bring in something like AI.

00:38But I met with a Taiwanese mechanical engineer who leads an alliance of experts

00:42across industries to help firms make this transition.

00:46And when I asked him overall where Vietnam is in this transformation,

00:50this is what he said.

00:52Only big companies have the resource to play with a very expensive big toy.

00:58But most of the majority, they cannot catch up.

01:01They don't even have the foundation to do it.

01:04In Asia, like Taiwan or Vietnam, they used to rely on people to exchange information.

01:11That won't be fast enough to solve the problem.

01:15We need a digitization tool, a computer, to connect all the data together.

01:20If you don't have a good tool and management, then usually it will take many days.

01:27If you're still on that stage, then it's impossible for you to use AI.

01:32When we talk about Industry 4.0, digital transformation,

01:36all this smart manufacturing, no single company can solve all the problems.

01:43So we need to put all the resources together to collaborate.

01:49And how different has it been implementing your concept in Vietnam versus in Taiwan?

01:55It's very interesting.

01:57Because Taiwan, a lot of people, they have their successful experience.

02:03So for experienced people, for experienced operation, it's more difficult to make change.

02:10And in Vietnam, luckily, they don't have such a burden.

02:15And because of the new opportunities in here,

02:19many Taiwanese businesses, their factories in Vietnam are even much bigger than the ones in Taiwan.

02:25The reality is the businesses have to survive in business, have some profit, so they can reinvest.

02:32AI, just like other technology, are just the tools for them to see,

02:38okay, is it a good time for me to adapt this solution to solve my problem,

02:42to improve my productivity, improve my profit?

02:46So just use the same mindset, then you will be okay.

02:52As you just heard there, some promising opportunities in Vietnam.

02:56But the make or break first step is to figure out how to get factory operations online.

03:02And to do that, you're going to need the right people and the right skills.

03:06Absolutely.

03:07And tomorrow, we'll take you into a university to speak with Vietnamese engineering students

03:12at the heart of this effort, because yes, education is a huge piece of this puzzle.

03:17So be sure to tune in tomorrow for that. Thank you, Joyce.

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