vietnamese and fast
There is a new player in South East Asia – VinFast. Vietnam’s first high volume automotive manufacturer, the company was born out of Vingroup, the country’s largest private corporation, in 2007. Involved in everything from real estate and retailing to hospitals, schools and farming, automobile manufacturing is now also part of their portfolio.
The owner of Vingroup, Pham Nhat Vuong, started his empire with an instant noodle business in Ukraine in 1993. In 2010, he sold it to Nestlé for US$150 million and was able to further expand his business into other areas.
VinFast is located in Hai Phong in northern Vietnam. Built on an artificial island, the plant covers 335 hectares and demonstrates a strong confidence to grow in the future. It’s a state of the art facility with fully automated production areas as well as a training facility for employees.
Former GM vice president Jim Deluca is CEO of VinFast, and many other former GM employees are also on board. VinFast has partnered up with GM in Vietnam and will be the exclusive distributor of Chevrolet in the country.
VinFast plant in Hai Phong. The factory started production of the SUV and SEDAN in June this year.
VinFast has chosen to use technology from well-established companies to jump ahead of the game. Partners include BMW, Pininfarina, Siemens, Bosch and MTEE. The engine for the first Sedan and SUV, the turbocharged Lux A2.0 and Lux SA2.0 are based on the previous generation BMW 2.0L gasoline engine with the famous BMW N20 turbocharger. Italian company Pininfarina has done the design. MTEE supplies the 4-cylinder petrol engines with twin scroll turbochargers. Both cars are aimed at the Vietnamese luxury car segment. The company is also producing e-scooters and a city car and will launch a BEV and e-bus at the end of the year.
Although the name might make you think about a fast car, Vin actually stands for “Vietnam” and Fast stands for F (Phong Cach) – “style”, A (An Toan) – “safety”, S (Sang tao) – “innovation”, T and (Tien Phong) – “pioneer”.
The passenger car market in Vietnam is still small – currently 23 cars per 1,000 people. However, as a country in rapid growth, VinFast forecasts the market will grow to 50 cars per 1,000 people in just a few years. Furthermore, because of the current trade sanctions between China and the US, a lot of companies are relocating their production to Vietnam, adding to a growing economy. VinFast plans to make 250,000 vehicles a year to begin with, and increase production to 500,000 vehicles a year by 2025. The aim is to start exporting to other countries by 2020, starting with Russia. The new carmaker has already received lots of pre-orders within Vietnam. VinFast will continue to extend their portfolio with the introduction of three ICE models and one or two BEVs, which will be designed and engineered in-house by VinFast.
