Today (Monday Apr 27, 2009 if you are curious lol), Nganluong.vn, Vietnamese Paypal, was officially launched, allows Vietnamese users to purchase from eBay without a Paypal account required. Nganluong.vn, together with Chodientu.vn belong to PeaceSoft Solution, a company invested by IDGVV and SoftBank China & India Holdings. Chodientu.vn is the biggest e-commerce site in Vietnam & the official partner of eBay here. And I’m sure their targets for Nganluong as well as Chodientu are set much higher than that.

As you already know, online payment is always considered as one of the biggest obstacles for e-commerce in Vietnam together with users’ consciousness and legal corridors. I haven’t tried it yet ços my stupid account at Vietnam is still locked up, but IMHO, the launch of Nganluong.vn has definitely lit up new hope about a future of being able to buy everything online Most of major e-commerce websites in the world still block trading from Vietnam (Am I too optimistic or too pessimistic??)

Some facts about Nganluong.vn and Chodientu-eBay:

- Nganluong.vn won’t cost you anything to use Nganluong.vn to buy things, but will cost sellers 1.000 VND + 1% total transaction value.

- After 4 months of piloting, Nganluong.vn now has 50,000 online payment accounts. Don’t know how many accounts are active and how many accounts they target after 1 year

- And ofcourse Nganluong.vn is not for eBay or Chodientu only, but PeaceSoft is willing to integrate Nganluong into any e-commerce website totally free of charge. Well from this point of view, can Nganluong.vn be seen as a competitor of other online payment company in Vietnam like VinaPay (another IDGVV’s porfolio), Paynet, Mobivi, OnePay, Payoo, etc.??? Actually I don’t know much about this competition things so anyone could please explain for me?

- Chodientu-eBay also partners with Vietnam Post & Telecom Group which allows users to debit money into their accounts at 3000 post offices in Vietnam. I just wonder if we can debit via mobile phones someday.

- Nganluong.vn accepts payments via local banks, including Vietcombank, DongA Commercial Bank, Techombank and Vietnam International Bank (VIB-Bank) and others in the Smartlink network. It also accepts payment via VISA, Master, Amex or JCB cards.

- Nganluong.vn guarantee 100% refund if you don’t recieve exactly the product you order. For more information about this program.

- Ebay’s Gross Merchandise Value from Vietnam’s users grew 82% in 2008.

Some facts about Vietnam Online Payment:

- Online Payment accounts for 3.2% total payment in Vietnam (account transfer, cash, post office transfer), according to Ministry of Industry & Trade.

- The biggest obstacles for Online Payment are: people’s habit of using cash; security & safety during online payment process; legal corridors for this type of payment are still under construction; online payment infrastructure.

- In 2007, JetStar Pacific was one of the first companies to allow customers to book tickets and pay online. And in the past 2 years, JetStar Pacific lost billions VND (more than 500,000 USD) because of risks during payment process.

- A recent survey of Vietnam E-commerce and Information Technology Agency on 50 e-commerce websites in Vietnam revealed that: (Frankly I don’t think Vietnam has that much so-called e-commerce websites)
+ 98% has information about products & services provided with prices but only 38% has a clear price structure.
+ 46% doesn’t have any transaction clause.
+ 98% doesn’t provide sufficient information about seller (name, age, phone number, email, business license, etc.) & 96% doesn’t have a policy to resolve contentions.
+ Only 12% publishes a policy to protect personal information.

Tags: Chodientu, E-Banking, E-Commerce, eBay, IDGVV, Nganluong, Online Payment, Paypal, PeaceSoft, Vietnam

“Every girl dreams of finding her Prince. But Prince is for Princess only, so I stopped dreaming at the age of 17.” - Hao Nguyen.

I haven’t been blogging so much lately, and this time is not because I’m lazy, I’m busy or I don’t know what to blog about; it’s all because of my cowardliness.

Sometimes I’m not as confident as I pretend to be, and I can be easily affected by others. As my blog got more popular, even just a little bit popular in a small community, **some people** started to talk about my age, my experience, and even my being a girl!!! So lame! Someone said that I was not a geek, I was non-tech, I was just a talker or my writing had no value at all, blah blah. It did upset me a lot, and it took me back to my stupid turtle shell.

But just several days ago, I talked about my problem with a respected friend of mine, and his words have definitely cheered me up a lot.

“You know. I always faced the same issue, but now I am older it is different. Some people see others with passion, ambition and ability as a threat…you don’t need to listen to them! Do you need to know how to grow a coffee plant to set-up a coffee chain, do you need to know SQL to be able to talk about websites. Don’t worry about what you don’t know, it’s not important. I have been in digital for 10 years and I really don’t know it all - who does.

What you do know is what’s good and bad on the web, what services have potential and what don’t, how social networks work, give value…etc,etc.

So don’t hide that knowledge. Sure, being a girl in this space may get the tech boys to pick holes in your thoughts, but know one is interested in what they say, we’re more interested in your view.

If you keep your blog as both commentary on tech in VN, plus your own experiences, events and views, I think it can build into a destination site.”

I just realized that I was such a cowardly idiot! I started my blog b/c I want to share my personal thoughts of ICT & Social Media scence in Vietnam, and I will continue it! Sharing personal thoughts on a personal blog has no fault at all! If you think my blog is worth-reading, I appriciate your time & your feedbacks for my blog. But if it is not, please don’t be too mean I’d love to know your opinions about how to make my blog a better destination, not like “your blog sux”.

Again, thanks a lot for reading this post. And again, I’m not gonna be affected by any negative comments. I’ve recieved a lot of good feedbacks about my blog, then who cares about a small black dot in a white sheet of paper? Stay tuned for my upcoming blog posts

Tags: blog, Chip, friends

Today is #barcamphanoi, and too bad I couldn’t come. But I can feel that it’s so great. A lot of live updates on Twitter.

There seem to be so many people attending #barcamphanoi. I don’t know the exact number but I guess it must be around 300 people =.=

Wifi doesn’t work so well, but I hope it’ll be fine.

People can check it live here http://live.barcamphanoi.org

Keep updated by live tweets here.

Pictures are here.

Slides for Barcamphanoi are here.

Well hope that you guys will keep tweets b/c I really want to see #barcamphanoi on Twitter trends

Congrats & thanks Ninh Nguyen, Hoat Le, Trung Kien & barcamphanoi gang for your great jobs

And some people please reserve a Barcamphanoi T-shirt for me.

Tags: barcamp, barcamphanoi

“Each year, the Asia Society hosts the high-profile, two-and-a-half-day Asian Corporate Conference, focusing on timely economic and business issues in the Asia-Pacific region. Since 1989, the Asian Corporate Conference has attracted an audience of more than 16,000 government leaders, diplomatic leaders, high-level executives, entrepreneurs, academics as well as prominent media makers from over 40 countries.

The Asian Corporate Conference 2009 will take place in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam from April 22 to 24.” (VietAbroader)

This year it is co-organized by The Wall Street Journal Asia and Ministry of Planning and Invesment - Vietnam. I deadly want to attend this event, so I decided to join Asian Society Contest. My audio response is here. I sat up until 4.30am this morning to work on it, so if you think my submission is good, please vote for me (you have to sign in to rate and comment ). I submitted it a little late, so I have only 4 days left to be voted

Here is the trascript.

“I love Vietnam, a lot! And I know the reason why is far more profound than just because I’m Vietnamese.

“Why do you love Vietnam?”, “What do you love the most about Vietnam?” are 2 questions we are most likely to ask foreigners when they come visit Vietnam. To answer, people usually have a hard time thinking and the results are normally: “Vietnam is a beautiful country, people are friendly, hard-working; the weather is great, food is awesome”. Yes nothing wrong with these answers, and I know many of you love Vietnam for the same reasons. But what about Vietnamese? What would they say if you ask them what they love the most their Motherland?

My friend once asked me that and he was kind of shocked when I couldn’t answer. “Why? You don’t love Vietnam?” Yes, I do, ofcourse, I love Vietnam so so much. But just like when you love someone, it’s hard to say which part of his or hers you love the most.

I love Vietnam because Vietnam has been always trying so hard for better things. Vietnam has not only recovered so fast after the terrible war, but also risen up. The Vietnam War ended only 15 years before I was born but I’ve grown up without suffering any consequence of the war or even worrying about that. It’s amazing. Now we have big cities with high buildings, industrial parks with modern technologies where only couples of ten years ago, bloody battles once took place. We have high-speed Internet connection, mobile networks anyone can use where communication was once almost impossible. We have schools, hospitals, supermarkets, restaurants, theatres everywhere. Many people don’t believe Vietnam could recover that fast, but we did. Government and many private funds are investing a great sum of money to develop our industries. “Boat people” was a sad story about people who risked their lives to escape from Vietnam on unseaworthy and unsafe boats during 1970s, following the Vietnam War. They have reason to hate Vietnam, but they are coming back. Several days ago, I had a chance to talk to a successful entrepreneur who had just returned to Vietnam to invest and do business. He was among “boat people”, and surprisingly, he told me that he was still a Vietnamese no matter what. They are coming back because they can see Vietnam’s future and they want to be a part of it.

People no longer think of Vietnam as a country of war, but as a part of the world. Vietnam has joined many worldwide organizations and successfully hosted many international events, and I believe The 19th Asian Corporate Conference will be one of them. It’s not uncommon to see a non-Vietnamese-speaking person riding a motorbike in Vietnam or to run into a Vietnamese when you are travelling out of Vietnam. Ho Chi Minh City is already a multi-cultural city with high percentages of Chineses, Cambodians and even Americans and Europeans. I’ve enjoyed my first Thanksgiving with turkey, potato and pumpkin cake right here in Vietnam, in an American friend’s apartment together with many friends from different countries. My grandmother doesn’t know a single English word, but on the day of Earth Hour, she reminded me to turn off the light, and you know what her reason is? To save the world.

A foreign friend of mine once asked me if I ever wished to be born and grew up in a more developed country. My answer is No. Vietnam has given me many good things, and the most valuable thing I have is Vietnamese spirit in my blood, the spirit to overcome difficulty and thirst for the best. Maybe Vietnam is small and still a developing country with many challenges and obstacles, but I know, Vietnam will overcome them all just like we did in the past, to be an Asian dragon someday. ”

Thanks a lot

Tags: asiansociety, vietabroader, Vietnam