Blog

AI tech consultancy Y.Digital launches an workplace in Vietnam

AI tech consultancy Y.Digital launches an office in Vietnam

The Dutch artificial intelligence consultancy Y.Digital has opened a new office in Da Nang City. Paul van der Hulst, CEO of Y.Digital, reflects on why the company chose Vietnam as the basis for its first international hub and what ambitions exist in the region.

First of all: What exactly does Y.Digital do?

With the help of automation and artificial intelligence (AI), we scale activities that people do best. The products we offer are non-linear conversation systems (chat, voice, portal, agents) and intelligent document processing and checking (CDD, KYC, AML, applications, explanations).

Our platform uses people as a blueprint and delivers context-related, versatile and highly scalable solutions. We work with a number of large companies in the Netherlands, including Achmea, ABN Amro and Tennet.

Why did you choose Asia, and Vietnam in particular, as the first hub for international expansion?

Asia is developing much faster than Europe. Unlike in Europe, in Asia you don’t first have to displace old technologies or concepts – it’s a blue ocean.

We have explored major cities in Asia since 2019 but found the best solution for Danang due to the talent base (large number of young and well educated people), the local ecosystem and the geographic location. It is a very attractive city to live in and has a world class international airport that will get you direct to all major cities within 1-2 hours. The perfect place to serve the Southeast Asia region.

In a press release you stated that Asia is ahead of Europe when it comes to using new technologies. Can you explain in more detail?

Yes, especially in B2C. After working and living in Asia, I have experienced firsthand the impact of mobile and digital on people’s lives and society. With the smartphone, people manage their bank account for the first time in their life and have access to all kinds of services (insurance, health care, grave, gojek) and information.

The zero cash society is a reality and, in some countries, entire generations of solutions have been skipped (e.g. credit cards). The pace of development and adoption of digital services is very impressive.

In the B2B area, however, Asia lags behind Europe in some respects. Many basic processes – especially in the area of ​​processing transactions and the associated papers – are still heavily dependent on manual labor in Asia. We see an opportunity here – to support organizations in the region in increasing their degree of automation.

Can you give us examples of Y.Digital’s work?

We have provided voice-operated healthcare assistants that enable healthcare professionals to call for help while treating a patient. The advantage is obvious: even when doctors have “their hands full”, they can review medical protocols or patient files. This voice-activated assistant is conversational rather than linear (not hard-coded and scripted, but adaptable and versatile).

We also deliver solutions for chat and omnichannel to banks, insurance companies and public institutions. Our team supports the process from design and build through implementation to learning and development.

The Vietnam team at Y.Digital

What synergies do you expect between the hubs in the Netherlands and Asia?

For some of our international customers, our new hub means that we can now also support them in the Asia-Pacific region.

For our company, I expect both hubs to be able to learn from each other. In Europe we can learn from advanced concepts for personal assistants, language-oriented solutions and food safety that are already a reality in Asia in consumer business, but also from developments such as the Smart City and Internet of Things. Meanwhile, in Asia we can fall back on the know-how and track record that we have built up in Europe.

In addition, we can support our customers around the clock with teams in different time zones.

What are the ambitions with the local office in Da Nang City?

Our goal is to serve customers in the region from our office in Danang and of course we want to grow. We are currently looking after customers in Japan, Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam and are expanding our team.

To achieve our growth mission, we will do what we have always done – deliver reliable, consistently high quality work. We focus on our main task and the reward will follow.