Da Nang: Asia’s newest emerging Innovation Hub

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In this week’s edition of Startup Vagabond we are diving into Da Nang, Vietnam and exploring its emergence as a growing Innovation superpower. I got to spend 5 days living and working in the Central Vietnamese city earlier this week and am already working on a way to go back!

I hope you can all make it there yourself some day and experience what I did for yourself!

Dickie

Da Nang: a rising star

“Where else in Asia can you have as good a work life balance as Da Nang?”

Exclaimed Trang Hanh Tran, a local Da Nang entrepreneur, who herself had just made the move back to the Central Vietnamese city, after a 12 years stint living and working in my native Melbourne.

It was a balmy Monday afternoon in Vietnam's third largest city and I’d gathered together with a group of local “Startup enthusiasts”.

To share chats about our passion for Innovation over a cup of the legendary Vietnamese Iced Coffee, at Local Beans, a new age coffee shop which wouldn’t look out of place in Brooklyn, New York.

“Not to mention the people! We are the friendly yet most hard working in Vietnam” continued Trang

This was my last day of five I’d spent living and working in Da Nang, which is now regularly finding its way into conversations about Asia’s “most liveable cities” and with what I’d experienced in my time here it was hard to disagree with her. 

Though the city has bigger ambitions than just attracting holidaymakers wowed by the beaches or the locals 

There’s an emerging Innovation hub bubbling under the surface, which is ready to burst out and put Da Nang on the emerging Startup ecosystem map.

A city undergoing a transformation

Da Nang has a population of 1.2 million people and is positioned smack bang in the middle of Vietnam on the shores of the East Vietnam Sea.

As a beach city equidistant from two of Vietnam’s most famous tourist haunts: The picturesque ancient town of Hoi An, famed for its adorned lanterns and the Imperial city of Hue, the country’s food capital

And only a 30 minute drive from the cool (for a Vietnamese summer at least) scenic Ba Na Hills 

Its economy has historically been heavily reliant on Tourism and Hospitality and it is easy to understand why.

Though in recent years there have been a flock of entrepreneurs that have taken up residence and the Government is doing all it can to support Da Nang’s Innovation growth

This can be seen in the Vietnam Information and Communications Technology applications and development readiness rankings

Which Da Nang has now topped for the 9th consecutive year

And by its consistently high performance in the Provincial Competitive Index ranking.

This is a ranking that the Communist Vietnamese Government uses to measure how its Provinces stack up in comparison across the same metrics.

Da Nang has been one of the standout performers and the Government are now putting all their backing into riding the wave of this Innovation boom

With reports suggesting that 163 recent innovation projects have helped to establish 61 new startup businesses’ and that there’s plenty more on the horizon terms of State-led support

There’s also a strong presence of Startup Infrastructure appearing in the Private sector with support offered from places such as DNES Business Incubator, Songhan Incubator (pictured below) and the Draper Startup House, which lists Da Nang as part of it’s portfolio of 19 global Startup Hubs 

Not a shabby place to do business

Once you’ve spent a day in Da Nang, it’s very easy to see the appeal of working here

“The locals love to shut off their laptops and be in the sea before 4pm here”

Ivan Paulo, the Founder of Koi Capital, a Venture studio based in Da Nang tells me, over a beachside beer at East West brewing Co

Itself a great place to find yourself on a Friday at 4pm

In terms of lifestyle, Da Nang really might be one of the best places to build your live while building your Startup  

It has:

• Labour and living costs which are reportedly 30% less than the Innovation capital Ho Chi Minh City

• Is only a 1 hour flight from Hanoi and HCMC, with an international airport just 10 mins away from the city, serving flights every hour to both hubs

• It’s small enough that it’s very easy to get around, compared to Vietnam’s two big cities yet there’s enough activity that it’s far from sleepy

• Which also makes it a great testing ground for new businesses before they have to fight it out in one of Vietnam’s bigger markets

• Plus the people were the most welcoming I encountered (and that’s in comparison to what is an extremely welcoming nation of people anyway!)

As a tourist hub it also boasts 6 million visitors annually, which means means the economy is booming year round and that money is also flowing into the government coffers

And it’s not just holidaymakers that are coming through the airport gates

There’s also a big influx of business tourism, especially from South Korea, which is only a 4 hour flight away

On my final day in Da Nang, there was even a new partnership between Da Nang and Daegu in South Korea announced between the local governments

It’s all feeling a little familiar

If you’re an Australian (like me) you might feel like you have deja vu reading this

A city built around a stretch of beachfront that has a booming tourism economy but is now focussing on an Innovation boom, backed by attracting “lifestyle entrepreneurs”

Are we talking about Da Nang or the Gold Coast? 

The irony that during in my last week in Australia before flying to Vietnam I’d just had a conversation with the Gold Coast Council about their Innovation ambitions was not lost on me

Though it’s hardly surprising that the two cities are currently on a similar trajectory

With the move to Industry 4.0 and with it an increased ease of doing business remotely, people are starting to choose lifestyle destinations over traditional Tech Hubs

And who wouldn’t choose to spend less money to live by the beach if you can access the same opportunities?!

My last meeting in Da Nang was the perfect representation of this

Sharing a beachside Coconut with Sydneysider Tim Noakesmith, one of the Founders of Australian FoodTech behemoth Vow

Tim who had recently stepped away from his full time involvement with Vow to focus on other opportunities had called Da Nang home for the last 4 months

“I moved here for a week and haven’t left, can you see why?” he told me with a wry smile

On reflection I’m starting to feel that I might have to do the same

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In the next edition we’ll be featuring the story of Vietnamese popup card sensation Lovepop and exploring how their Founders took an idea from the Streets of Vietnam to a global sensation selling across the world.

See you on the next adventure!

Dickie