Techfest Vietnam 2017 is one of the largest National annual events for the entire stakeholders in Vietnam ecosystem. The event is endorsed by the Ministry of Science and Technology co-organized together with many ministries, agencies and other startup ecosystem builders in Vietnam. The event in this year is different to the previous event, with the model of start-up village to attract investors for start-ups. In order to attract investors, each start-ups participating in Techfest Vietnam 2017 will develop their own proposals to call for investment in accordance with requirements of each start-up village.
The partners at Techfest 2017 will be in charge of building up contents to attract targeted attendees in each village (based on famous tech area), namely: Community, Agritech, Edtech, Medtech, Tourism and F&B, Emerging tech.
Currently, Vietnam has not had any official documents on the national ecosystem for startups. Therefore, the legal system lacks many regulations for startups based on creative innovation such as support from the state budget for failure in startups or other financial problems. Mechanisms and policies for startups such as preferential tax policies are needed to help investors feel secure when investing in the startup ecosystem.
In addition to strengthening connection between Vietnamese outstanding startups and domestic and foreign investors, and sharing information and experience among the components in the startup ecosystem, the event also aimed at introducing startup programs as well as outstanding scientific and technological products. With the goal of connecting startups with domestic and foreign investors, creating and developing the startup ecosystem, the event will engage the attention and participation of the majority of society. In particular, this would be an opportunity for local start-ups to look for foreign investment capital sources for the national startup movement and startups associated with creative innovation.
The Ministry of Science and Technology said, recently, activities to promote the start-up ecosystem have been implemented consistently and attracted investors for many projects. At present, Vietnam has nearly 40 venture capitals, with the participation of leading corporation such as Creative fund of CMC, FPT Ventures, Viettel Ventures, Vietnam Start-up Accelerator funds with 4 main investors of FPT, Dragon Capital Group, Hanwha (Korea) and BIDV Securities Company.
In the previous Techfest 2016, with the presence of Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam, the event was the meeting place for 180 outstanding start-ups, 120 domestic and international investors, about 3,000 visitors turning up to the event. The main activities at event include start-up products and services exhibition, panel discussion and workshops, investment matching, start-up discovery competition and honoring ceremony for “Vietnam innovative start-ups 2017”.
Following the success of previous events, this year Techfest 2017 with the theme “Ecosystem connect”, will bring about the new spirit for the event in 2016. Techfest 2017 is characterized by the participation of relevant Ministries in the national project “Supporting the National Innovative Startup Ecosystem in Vietnam by the year 2025” (National Project 844) approved by The Prime Minister on May 18th, 2016, and the participation of outstanding partners in the startup community in Vietnam and in the region, such as e27 Singapore (organizer of Echelon – a series of startup events in different countries) or Malaysian Global Innovation & Creativity Center (MaGIC), etc.
Techfest 2017 is expected to attract around 3000 attendees, including at least:130 startups and booth exhibitors, 130 local and international investors, 80 large enterprises, corporations and organizations supporting startups and 60 reporters from national and international official newspapers.
