Vietnam and Japan will join hands to develop a semiconductor industry in Vietnam, as stipulated at a cooperation agreement signed between the Integrated Circuit Design Research & Education Centre (ICDREC) under Vietnam National University - Ho Chi Minh City, and Japan’s Nagano science and technology fund on January 19.

Integrated Circuit research and design at the ICDREC.

Accordingly, they will cooperate to design and manufacture integrated circuits while providing human resources training in the semiconductor sector, and exchanging scientific research and information in the field.

The cooperation agreement is billed as a milestone to spread Ho Chi Minh City’s integrated circuit (IC) Industrial Development Programme to the world, and serves as a golden opportunity to enlarge Vietnam’s collaboration in the field with foreign countries, particularly Japan - the world’s leading semiconductor producer.

According to Le Thai Hy, deputy head of the steering committee for the programme, international cooperation has a crucial role to play to further semiconductor development in Vietnam. He said that Vietnam is falling behind other countries in the sector and is facing a line-up of difficulties.

The ICDREC has received much attention from Japanese partners since attending SEMICON Japan 2015 - an international exhibition for the microelectronics manufacturing industry held in Tokyo.

During the December 14-16 exhibition, representatives from the ICDREC showcased a number of chips they have been developing, including SG8V1, HF RFID, ADC 24 and UHF RFID, and some other chip-based products.

The Vietnamese team attended SEMICON Japan to learn firsthand about the country’s policies and demand for microelectronic products, as part of Ho Chi Minh City’s project to design support mechanisms and policies for the development of its IC industry.

VNA