Driving digital transformation in Vietnam

Denis Brunetti - President for Vietnam, Myanmar, Cambodia, and Laos, Ericsson

As in other parts of the world, the next wave of socioeconomic development in Vietnam will come from innovation, science, and technology, driven by the digital economy. 5G will serve as the critical national infrastructure that will enable the digitalisation of services and financial inclusion, such that Vietnam can boost its economy.

People in Vietnam will experience a new digital lifestyle and businesses will be able to leverage the benefits of enhanced mobility, flexibility, reliability, and security that 5G offers. The applications that will run on top of 5G will create major value for society, consumers, and industry.

5G will enable Vietnam to unlock the potential of Industry 4.0 and will be the foundation on which Vietnam can further build on its digital transformation journey and realise the government’s vision. Digitalisation, driven by advances in cellular connectivity, is helping drive leaps in productivity, flexible operations, worker safety, and even sustainability.

5G will pave the way for increased investments in smart manufacturing capabilities in Vietnam, supporting the government’s vision and focusing on driving an increased and sustainable annual productivity growth rate of 7 per cent by 2025.

At our own smart factory in Texas, where connectivity comes from a state-of-the-art 5G network, technology is enabling incredible efficiencies at the facility itself. An asset-tracking solution digitally integrates with factory floor sensors to track critical assets’ location, condition and status in real-time. The solution provides real-time visibility of finished goods on the production floor and brought an immediate impact: a 10 per cent increase in repair tech productivity and a 5 per cent reduction in rework and waste.

This shows how 5G technology and automation are helping us improve productivity and, as a result, this facility has been recognised by the World Economic Forum as a global Industry 4.0 frontrunner.

Solutions like these have been designed to solve challenges across a variety of different areas and generate tangible and significant business impact, including cost reduction, improved uptime, improved quality, and much more.

In fact, according to our just-released Future of Enterprises Report, when manufacturing companies think of what advanced wireless networks they will need for ICT-enabled production tools, 5G is at the top of their wish list. As we found in our research, the majority of manufacturers expect the introduction of 5G in their production systems within the next 5 years.

Based on our own global studies, it is clear that digitalisation is a clear top priority for businesses. The possibilities that the Internet of Things and 5G create for enterprises will put them on a fast track to meet the demands of the new world, whilst also contributing to the sustained and inclusive socioeconomic development of the country.

Like many critical industries, the oil and gas industry is looking to digitalisation to bring operations into the modern era, improving efficiency, productivity, and safety across every aspect of the business. But a strong, primary network is needed as a foundation to empower the most exciting and value-creating use cases – and a private cellular network is perfect for the job.

Refineries are vast outdoor environments, with many moving parts that need to be tracked. The networks supporting these complex, sprawling installations are often a patchwork of different technologies, all at varying states of modernisation, further complicating the already fragile digital transformation efforts that some oil and gas companies have underway.

To transform the oil and gas industry, networks need to be reliable, powerful and secure. LTE private networks can deliver what the industry needs right now while laying the foundation for a seamless transition to 5G and beyond, giving IT managers and others a single network that’s easier to manage than several disparate technologies.

And it will result in value creation – the use of advanced connectivity to optimise drilling and production throughput and improve maintenance and field operations, which could eventually add up to $250 billion of value to oil and gas upstream operations by 2030, according to McKinsey.

Oil and gas facilities are complicated operations and will likely always have a mix of technologies. However, a strong cellular 3GPP-based network, on 4G/LTE or 5G, can act as the primary network, supporting and linking things like Wi-Fi or hard-wired systems together into a cohesive unit that can be monitored and controlled from a central location.

With increased scrutiny of critical infrastructure, the security and encryption built into the 3GPP standards and proven robust commercial network deployments, private networks will play a major role in the digitalisation of oil and gas – keeping data onsite and self-contained, limiting its vulnerability to malicious actors.

Beyond productivity measures, the superior connectivity of private cellular networks will increase worker safety. Remotely controlled machines such as automated guided vehicles and drones can cover large areas quickly and can be deployed in places human workers can’t reach, or where they would be unsafe.

Industries are facing multiple pressures at once – a need to streamline operations, improve worker safety, and harden systems against cyberattacks, even as more and more aspects of day-to-day operations are digitalised. Private networks give oil and gas companies a primary network to manage and coordinate the disparate technologies that exist in oil and gas facilities – providing a platform for innovation that will drive value today and into the future.

The upside to digitalisation is massive. An Ericsson and Arthur D. Little study found that a digitally-enabled workforce is 8.5 per cent more productive, has 48 per cent less loss from health and safety incidents, and that companies see an 8 per cent reduction in operational spending, due to increased effectiveness.

In addition, according to an Ericsson 5G for Business Study, 5G-enabled business revenues for service providers in Vietnam could be to the tune of $1.54 billion by 2030 with sectors like manufacturing, energy/utilities, and healthcare leading the way.

Coupled with Vietnam’s National Innovation Center initiative, the government’s investment in sustainably growing the nation’s startup ecosystem will also contribute significantly to the country’s innovation capacity and the establishment of a thriving digital economy leveraging 5G as the enabling platform.