A Vietnamese official confirmed that SpaceX and information ministry representatives had held several meetings from at least the middle of last year until November 2023.
But the discussions were interrupted in the last quarter of 2023 when it became clear that lawmakers in the Communist-ruled country would not soften foreign ownership limits for SpaceX, the industry source told Reuters.
SpaceX had been seeking an exception to Vietnamese rules limiting foreign ownership to a non-controlling 50% stake of telecommunication companies with network infrastructure, the industry source said.
This desire to have locals own everything is self sabotaging. There are 8 billion people on earth, and Vietnam only has 1/80th of the Earth population. Innovative companies would rather spend their time on innovation than on dealing with bureaucracy. As a result, only subpar international companies will take the time to navigate the bureaucratic landscape of Vietnam. This limits the people’s exposure to only second-tier services and products, which reduces the likelihood of inspiration and dreamers. Dreamers need to innovate against the cutting edge, not against B-tier products.
I really wish the country was more friendly to businesses. Their neighbor two hours away (Singapore) is literally the friendliest country on Earth for establishing businesses. Even Dyson relocated there from Europe.
People who disagree with me might say that they want local ownership to prevent foreign companies exploring the market and sending profits offshore, but ask yourself this: what is better for the country? To have complete control and ownership of a small playground, or to have partial control over a huge national park?
Without exposure to innovative products, the internal standard for quality & ease of use is lower than international standards, meaning that products developed domestically will never stand a chance in the global market. This isn't about Starlink, this is about AWS. This is about GCP. This is about Google Maps (yes, companies based in Vietnam CANNOT use the Google Maps API and Google will block your API access if you have too many Google Maps Platform users originating from Vietnam).
Do you want to send text messages to Vietnamese users? Guess what, you need to send paperwork with company stamps to your provider. So many processes require company stamps. I'm not even kidding, I've had to deal with it.
Vietnam needs to be more business friendly to attract the best and the brightest to build businesses in Vietnam. Not only that, they need to be business friendly to keep the next generation of Vietnamese entrepreneurs. Right now they view starting and building their businesses overseas as the easier choice. Being a developing country is not an excuse for the current state of affairs, as in a single year they could change the laws if they really wanted to.
This is not a criticism of the form of government here, as any form of government could be business friendly if they wanted to.