The government of Vietnam has signed an agreement with Ericsson through which the latter will help accelerate the adoption of Industry 4.0 in the Asian nation, the Swedish vendor said in a release.
According to the Brookings Institute, Vietnam exported $ 45 billion worth of mobile phones that were manufactured in the country during 2017. Between 2014 and 2016, the country also added nearly 1.5 million manufacturing jobs. Through this new agreement, Ericsson said it will help Vietnam’s manufacturing sector to boost the adoption of Industry 4.0.
The “Industry 4.0 & IoT Innovation Cooperation Agreement” between Ericsson and the state-owned communications service provider VNPT Group will expand IoT capabilities across the operator’s mobile network by leveraging Ericsson’s IoT cellular capability and VNPT’s IoT ecosystem. Through these capabilities, the state-run telco will be able to provide new digital services to its consumer and enterprise customers as well as support e-Government initiatives.
The agreement will also benefit local industries including manufacturing, agriculture, transport and energy, and supports the government’s vision of leveraging science, technology and innovation to drive the next wave of socioeconomic development in Vietnam, according to Ericsson’s statement.
“The joint initiative between VNPT and Ericsson supports the group’s ambition of driving smart city and Industry 4.0 initiatives across Vietnam,” said Pham Duc Long, CEO of VNPT Group. “We are creating additional value for our consumer and enterprise customers now through advanced digital services enabled by 4G NB-IoT for less demanding massive IoT use cases, and then 5G for more advanced use cases with much higher data volumes and extreme low-latency requirements in the very near future.”
“VNPT Group and Ericsson are seeking to build an innovation platform and foundation for Industry 4.0 through this partnership. By providing our 4G NB-IoT capabilities as well as leveraging our recently launched ‘IoT Innovation Hub’ in Vietnam, we are looking to fuel and drive the IoT ecosystem in Vietnam and create momentum towards 5G,” said Denis Brunetti, head of Ericsson Vietnam and Myanmar.
In April 2019, Ericsson and Vietnam’s Ministry of Science & Technology, launched the country’s first IoT innovation hub that supports start-ups and promotes entrepreneurship. It also serves as a learning and education platform as well as a research and development platform focusing on accelerating Vietnam’s advancement in IoT.
