Building a Complete Innovative Start-up Ecosystem

In recent years, the term start-up has been mentioned a lot in Da Nang, it must be said that Da Nang is one of the places with particular interest and specific policies to support start-up and creative activities.

Da Nang is one of the first localities to develop a start-up support scheme. Accordingly, Da Nang has developed "Supporting the innovative start-up ecosystem in Da Nang City to 2020" project with many specific points.

In particular, Da Nang has focused on fully implementing the Government's supporting policies; promulgating and finalizing policies to support the city's innovative start-ups; building a city innovative start-up portal connected to the National innovative start-up portal.

Da Nang’s project of supporting the start-up ecosystem also aims to support about 200 projects and 80 start-ups with at least 20% of businesses calling for successful capital from investors; setting up 2 to 3 social enterprise incubators or public-private partnerships; striving to have 50% of high schools, professional secondary schools, and vocational secondary schools having innovative clubs; 100% of universities and colleges having entrepreneurship curriculum; 100% of universities and colleges having innovative start-up clubs; establishing Da Nang Start-up Support Fund; and attracting 3-5 venture capital funds to set up representative offices in Da Nang.

According to Mr. Tran Van Tung, Deputy Minister of Science and Technology, in recent years, Da Nang has made positive steps. The city has formed and developed an innovative start-up ecosystem, developing and issuing start-up policies as well as technical facilities for start-ups, especially the project of making Da Nang the center of national innovative start-ups in the Central and Central Highlands regions.

Start-up and innovation have become topical issues in Da Nang and have a positive effect on society. Although Da Nang still has a certain gap compared to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City in terms of stature, scale and maturity of innovative start-ups, but the aspirations, beliefs of the people and commitment of the local government to develop innovative start-ups have spread broadly and never been as strong as now.

 People were once quite confused with "start-up", but now this concept has become popular. With angel investment funds, venture capital funds, incubation programs are also more open to support start-ups. Students, pupils, young people, who were indifferent to start-ups, are now more conscious and embark on starting a business.

According to statistics, in the last 3 years, the incubators in Da Nang have created more than 60 start-up projects focusing on the fields of tourism, agriculture, health care, education, food, information technology, transportation and environment. Some start-up projects are also the investors’ interest and raise investment capital successfully. In particular, the Da Nang Business Incubator (DNES) is currently the leading unit.

25 is the number of start-up projects across the country that have been receiving support from DNES for nearly two years of operation. A number of supported projects have gained outstanding achievements. In addition to establishing businesses, these projects have raised capital, increased revenue and expanded business markets across the country.

Currently, Da Nang continues to promote the integration of elements in the city's innovative start-up ecosystem, linking start-up ecosystems in the Central and Central Highlands provinces; accessing expert resources, investors, international capital and technology to introduce and connect with the local community. The local government will step by step form and develop a community of angel investors, venture capital funds and a start-up community in Da Nang City.

 At the 2019 Da Nang City Innovative Start-up Day, Mr. Le Trung Chinh, Vice Chairman of Da Nang People's Committee, said: “We hope that in the near future, Da Nang will form a complete start-up innovative ecosystem, becoming an attractive destination linking the best creative start-up resources, and bringing domestic and international start-ups here for cooperation, investment, development, competition and conquering the global market together."