🧠 Food for thought

Implications, context, and why it matters.

Vietnam’s US tech charm offensive draws on a tougher legal playbook

• Talk at the forum focused on improving the investment climate, while new laws and regulations have already started to reshape it.
• Circulars taking effect from late October to early November 2025 offer incentives, including full exemptions from land use and rental fees for projects building strategic digital technology products and services such as AI and semiconductors 1.
• A state-backed Investment Support Fund offers direct, cost-based support for high-tech work, with semiconductor research and development (R&D) centers potentially qualifying for subsidies covering up to 50% of initial investment costs 2.
• The National Innovation Centre (NIC), a co-organizer of the forum, offers practical perks at its sites, including one-day business registration and access to state investment credit loans for eligible borrowers that meet loan requirements 3.

Vietnam’s niche plan aims for the supply chain’s middle ground

• Advanced chip fabrication below 3 nm (nanometers, a measure of chipmaking scale) can demand more than $10 billion in spending, so the current push centers elsewhere 4.
• Effort is flowing into assembly, testing, and packaging, building on the existing electronics manufacturing base to lock in a defined place in the global value chain 5.
• Policy updates add corporate income tax incentives for electronic equipment manufacturers that meet conditions such as using semiconductor chips designed/produced/packaged/tested in Vietnam, involving at least 30% Vietnamese enterprises in the supply chain, and committing to technology transfer 1.
• That approach supports firms that want diversified supply chains and lower geopolitical risk, while avoiding a head-to-head fight with established semiconductor leaders 5.