Overview of Vietnam language services industry

2. OUTLINE
1. Overview of Vietnam Market
2. Opportunities and Challenges from the Integration into AEC and TPP
3. Translation Trends
4. Roles of Associations
5. Issues Remained in the Translation Industry

3. 1. OVERVIEW OF VIETNAM MARKET
1. Population: 90,630,000 (Estimated in 2014)
2. Area: 332,698 km2
3. GDP: USD 187 billion (2014); per capita: USD 2072
4. Market:
- Domestic Enterprises: 375,000 enterprises in operation
- Countries with FDI in Vietnam: Korea; Japan; Singapore; Hong Kong; Taiwan
- Total FDI received in 2014: USD 22 billion
- Oversea Investment Demand

4. VIETNAM TRANSLATION MARKET
Translation Industry Value: USD 100 million
Clients
 Individual Clients (15%): Demand for notarized translation
(immigration, oversea study, labour export, etc.)
 Enterprises (local, oversea, FDI) (80%)
 NGOs (5%)
Major Fields
- Engineering
- Medicine
- Website Localization
- Finance
- Legislation
- Publication

5. VIETNAM MARKET VS. GLOBAL MARKET
Items Vietnam Global
Revenue USD 100 million USD 45 billion
LSPs 500 18,000
Natural growth rate 30% 13%
Allocation Hanoi; HCM America: 39%; Europe
49%; Asia: 12%
Maturity 20 years 100 years
Freelancer Part-time At high professionalism
Service buyer Poor understanding of
quality requirements and
inadequate investment
Spending 1-3% revenue
on Localization

6. CLIENT BUYING CHARACTERISTICS
• Low awareness of the importance of translation in business
(the translation owns the same value as the original)
• Low cost expectation
• Vague in the definition of “correct translation”
• Revenue from big account: 30 million – 1 billion VND/year

7. VIETNAMESE TRANSLATION COMPANIES
Translation Companies: over 500
 Foreign Companies take up 5%
 Law firms, events companies, publishers providing translation
service takes up 10%
 Years of experience: ≤ 20

8. SOME CHARACTERISTICS OF VIETNAMESE
TRANSLATION COMPANIES
Strengths:
- Good quality foundation
- Solid relationship with local clients
- Service price lower than the average level in the region and in other
part of the world
Weaknesses
- Companies possessing ISO certified quality management processes
accounting for 1% only
- Failure to meet international clients’ requirements

9. Opportunities: Prospective Clients
- FDI growth:
101 countries and territories
Value: USD 22 billion (2014)
- TPP Agreement, ASEAN Economic Community (AEC)
Challenges
- Strict requirements on quality and deadline
- Competition with international companies
- Upgradation of translation technology

10. FREELANCERS
Number: approximately 100,000
Profile:
+ Graduated from national and international universities majored in foreign
studies
+ Experienced in studying and working oversea
Great freelancer forum: Proz, Freelancer, TranslatorsCafe, TranslatorsBase
→ Increasingly high rate of clients using freelancers
(Shared B2C economic such as Onehourtranslation…), making up 80% of global
market share.
- Easy search in internet
- Low cost
- Simple procedure

11. POPULAR LANGUAGES
English
Chinese
Japanese
Korean
French
Thai
German
Laos
Russian
Spain
Domestic:
• English, Chinese, Japanese, Korean,
Vietnamese continue to be dominant →
Strong competitiveness
• Tending to fast develop: Laos, Cambodia,
Thai, Bermese → Medium
competitiveness
Foreign:
• Compete in English<> Asian language
pairs
Trends of languages

12. LANGUAGE SERVICES
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
Service coverage in the overall industry
value
Service coverage in
the overall industry
value

13. 3. SERVICE TRENDS IN 2016
• Fast growing services:
• Desktop publishing
• Website localization
• Translation: Industries are supported or directly affected by TPP
• (Legal Affairs, Finance-Banking, Transport-Logistics, Import &
Export, Training,…)

14. INDUSTRY’S COMMON FACTS
• Low service rates, in comparison with the values that bring; with English
translations price ranging from VND 50,000 – 800,000/page
 Consequences: employees give up the industry, translators give up the
career
• Many individually operated and small-scaled businesses, without any grips
over freelancer’s input quality and products' output qualities, leading to
Clients’ equation of low quality
• ISO-based quality management is paid little to no attention and poorly
implemented at translation companies
• Freelancer: proz.com as international market, direct assignment from Clients
for Vietnamese market (Good price); From Translation Company: Low rate
due to low rate from Clients
• Freelancers rarely get a hold on translation technologies, such as Trados,
Wordfast, ...
• There is still no organization to manage and regulate to support translation
and interpretation industry

15. TRANSLATION’S ROLES IN ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT
• Required conditions for administrative procedures
• Discussion and negotiation support
• Vital requirement in enterprises’ brand development
and promotion

16. 2. OPPORTUNITIES AND CHALLENGES
FROM INTEGRATION INTO AEC AND TPP
• Population: 625
million - Youth 60%
• GDP: USD2,398 billion
• GDP Growth: 4.4%
• Total Trade:
USD2,531 billion
• Total FDI: USD136
billion
• Tourist Arrivals: 102
million

17. - 12 countries, 790 million people
- TPP Members are responsible for 40
percent of the world’s GDP and 26
percent of the world’s trade
- TPP will have a stronger effect on
Vietnam than WTO will

18. OPPORTUNITIES FOR FREELANCERS AND LSPS FROM
INTEGRATION
• Demands of foreign enterprises
• Demands of Vietnamese enterprises investing overseas
• Demands of governmental and non-governmental organizations
• Vietnamese enterprises are more advantageous in price and quality

19. 4. ROLES OF ASSOCIATIONS
National Interpretation and Translation Centre
(NITC)
VATI: Vietnam Association of Translation Industry
Your Translator Community

20. VIETNAM ASSOCIATION OF
TRANSLATION INDUSTRY
VATI

21. I. MISSIONS, VISIONS, CORE VALUES
2.1. Missions:
- Strengthen and advance the role of translation industry in course of global
integration and national development
- Reconstruct the industry standards, certification in the coming time
2.2. Visions
- Establish a strong Association with 59 members in 2015 and introduce an
official Association in 2018 with 500 members
- Establish the translation industry with the role comparable to other industries
and highly valued in Vietnam
2.3. Core values
Accurate, professional, honest

22. II. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE
3.1. Advisory Board (3-5 members)
3.2. Executive Board (10-15 members)
1. President (3-year term): 01
2. Vice President : 02
3. Secretary General (01) and the Secretariat
4. Treasurer: 01
5. Chairpersons:
- Chairperson of Board of Member
- Chairperson of Board of Communications and Events
- Chairperson of Board of International Relation
- Chairperson of Standardization and Certification
- Chairperson of Supervisory Board
- Chairperson of Board of Translation Technology
3.3. Founder Members

23. III. ACTION PLAN
In 2015
- Press release and conference on establishment of Vietnam Association of
Translation Industry, introduction of Executive Board.
- Translator Day: 28/11/2015
Annual activities
- 03 events/year including topic conferences for 30-50 participants
- 01 big event/1-2 year, 100-300 participants
- Executive Board meeting monthly: Online or Offline

24. 5. ACTIONS TO BE TAKEN
• Raise value, quality, and perception of translation companies
in the industry.
• Notarized translation policy (Translators; Translation
companies possessing notary stamps)
• Grant certification of translation and interpretation
• Improve people’s recognition of translation and interpretation
• Promote international connection and trading

25. Thank you
Q & A