The STEM Pipeline
Vietnam’s startup ecosystem is heavily influenced by founders with backgrounds in STEM, science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. According to the survey on the Startup Ecosystem in Vietnam 2019, the majority of startup founders come from STEM or economics-related disciplines. This pattern is consistent with the global trend, where technical knowledge and analytical training provide a strong foundation for innovation-driven entrepreneurship.
There are several reasons why STEM graduates are overrepresented in Vietnam’s startup scene. First, the country has made significant investments in technical education, particularly in universities such as the Hanoi University of Science and Technology and Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology. These institutions not only produce a high volume of STEM graduates, but also act as gateways to innovation labs, hackathons, and R&D programs that plant the seeds for entrepreneurial ambition.
Second, STEM-trained individuals often possess the ability to solve complex problems, build technical prototypes, and understand product feasibility, core competencies in tech startups. Their familiarity with emerging technologies such as AI, IoT, blockchain, and renewable energy systems enables them to imagine solutions that address real-world challenges, from smart mobility to digital health.
Lastly, STEM backgrounds often grant access to peer networks, competitions, and grant programs (including state-backed ones such as Project 844) that can accelerate the path to founding. This makes the STEM-to-startup route appear not only accessible, but logical and well-supported.
What It Really Takes to Build a Startup
While a STEM education equips founders with technical tools and problem-solving skills, it is far from the sole ingredient for startup success. In fact, many Vietnamese startup founders find themselves navigating challenges that no academic degree, technical or otherwise, fully prepares them for.
According to the survey on the Startup Ecosystem in Vietnam 2019, while many founders have STEM roots, their most pressing struggles were not technical. Instead, they cited lack of access to capital, difficulty hiring skilled talent, market testing limitations, and weak business strategy as the primary hurdles. These issues demand cross-functional thinking and real-world experience more than textbook knowledge.
Additionally, Vietnam’s fragmented startup support ecosystem means that non-technical founders often have to rely on external technical support, from accelerators, outsourced teams, or CTO-for-hire models, to compensate for the gap. Startup support organizations like BK-Holdings, and DNES are helping bridge these divides by offering mentorship, tech matchmaking, and ecosystem navigation.
In short, while STEM may open the door to ideation and early prototyping, the ability to build a resilient business often comes down to skills outside the STEM spectrum. As Vietnam’s ecosystem matures, a more diverse founder profile, with interdisciplinary teams, could become the norm rather than the exception.
The Hidden Gap
Despite Vietnam producing thousands of STEM graduates each year, only a small fraction pursue entrepreneurship. This mismatch raises important questions: What’s stopping technically trained individuals from building startups? And is the STEM-to-startup pipeline more myth than reality?
According to the survey on the Startup Ecosystem in Vietnam 2019, most founders came from STEM or economics backgrounds. However, deeper ecosystem data shows that many of these STEM-trained individuals do not actually launch startups, but instead seek stable careers in corporations, government R&D institutes, or tech outsourcing firms. Risk aversion, lack of entrepreneurial training, and limited exposure to startup culture are often cited as key barriers.
Several university-affiliated innovation hubs, such as Songhan Incubator (Da Nang) and Hue Innovation Hub, report that while their cohorts are rich in engineering talent, few participants fully commit to launching ventures post-program. Similarly, in programs run by NSSC or Bach Khoa Innovation, organizers note a recurring pattern: strong technical prototypes with little follow-through due to business model weakness or lack of market orientation.
Moreover, the current education pipeline in Vietnam rarely integrates entrepreneurship as a core competency in STEM programs. Initiatives like Vietnam Silicon Valley (VSV) or Zone Startups Vietnam have tried to address this gap by embedding training on business development, fundraising, and go-to-market strategies, but scale remains limited.
In effect, while Vietnam’s STEM talent pool is growing, much of it remains untapped by the startup ecosystem. The challenge ahead is not just producing more engineers, but empowering them to think and act like entrepreneurs.
Valid STEM Paths
While a STEM degree isn’t a prerequisite for founding a startup, there are founders in Vietnam whose strong technical training clearly shaped their ventures. In these cases, domain expertise not only accelerated product development but also built credibility with investors and early adopters.
Elsa Speak, co-founded by Vu Van, is one of the most globally recognized edtech startups from Vietnam. Vu Van holds an MBA from Stanford and a Master’s in Education from the University of San Francisco. While not a classic STEM degree holder, she built Elsa by closely collaborating with machine learning experts to apply speech recognition to non-native English speakers. The company recruited heavily from AI and NLP specialists, and this technical edge helped Elsa raise over $20 million, including from Gradient Ventures (Google’s AI fund).
akaBot, developed under FPT Software, was led by a team deeply rooted in engineering and automation. While akaBot is an internal product rather than a startup in the traditional sense, it has spun off into a business line with international traction, providing robotic process automation (RPA) solutions. FPT’s emphasis on internal incubation by engineering-trained teams exemplifies how STEM backgrounds can enable deep-tech commercialization.
EM&AI is a Vietnamese startup focused on building conversational AI and NLP solutions for enterprises, including tools like Virtual Agent (chat/voicebot) and Virtual QC for call center quality control. Its leadership team includes individuals with AI research and engineering expertise; their solutions automate call analysis and improve customer service efficiency for financial institutions, telecoms, and more.
While a STEM background does not guarantee success, it can serve as a powerful advantage, especially in sectors such as AI, enterprise software, and automation. However, the key differentiator lies not just in the degree, but in how founders leverage technical skills to solve real problems, recruit strong teams, and iterate quickly based on user needs.
Vietnam’s startup landscape continues to evolve, and while STEM-trained founders are present, they do not dominate as one might expect in a tech-driven era. The path from technical expertise to startup success is neither automatic nor linear. Rather than acting as a guaranteed fast track, STEM backgrounds appear to be one component, not the determinant of a founder’s journey.
What We’ve Learned:
- STEM backgrounds are prevalent but not dominant: Many startup founders come from STEM fields, reflecting a strong technical foundation in the ecosystem. However, there is also significant representation from economics, business, and non-traditional backgrounds, highlighting the diversity of entrepreneurial pathways in Vietnam.
- Technical skills matter most in certain verticals: In deep tech sectors like AI, automation, and platform engineering, STEM skills provide a distinct edge. Elsewhere, such as in edtech, e-commerce, or consumer services, market understanding and business acumen often play a more central role.
- The real differentiators are execution and ecosystem support: Access to mentorship, funding, and market-testing opportunities often outweigh technical credentials in determining startup survival and growth.
Policy Considerations
For policymakers and ecosystem builders looking to support tech entrepreneurship:
- Promote interdisciplinary programs: Encourage university-level and post-graduate programs that blend STEM with entrepreneurship, design thinking, and go-to-market strategy.
- Support applied R&D and commercialization pathways: Many STEM-trained individuals remain in academia or public labs. Bridging these environments with the startup world through funding, incubation, or IP transfer can unlock untapped potential.
- Invest in technical talent for scale-ups: While not every founder must be technical, scaling startups need strong engineering leadership. Supporting deep talent pools in data science, AI, and software engineering is critical.
- Avoid narrow founder stereotypes: A healthy startup ecosystem thrives on diversity, not just in gender or region, but in educational background and experience. Both technical and non-technical founders bring value.
