Today, we had the pleasure of visiting two companies for site visits. In the morning, we began with Coherent, a company dedicated to high-technology developments primarily in optics and a few other fields of technology. Coherent is mainly a material science company, but they hire in many disciplines of engineering. The company has grown very rapidly over the past years, and one thing that contributed to this was their mindset about their employees. No matter the background and education of their employees, Coherent works from the ground up to train their employees over at least six months before they begin to work. I found that this was one of the main contributing factors to their growth and effects on high technology development in Vietnam. Their work and the quality at which they do it truly impressed me this morning.

In the afternoon, we were able to visit Saigon Hi-Tech Park, one of three national hi-tech industrial parks in all of Vietnam. The park hosts sites for manufacturing and research & development of high-technology products to be implemented into the Vietnamese economy. I was very intrigued by their dedication to research & development, and how that sets them apart from the other hi-tech parks within the country. Companies that work within the park are required to allocate their resources to research & development to foster innovation in the park, which is not a requirement for all hi-tech industries. Furthermore, I was impressed by their training center which directly trains students to research and develop high-technology products. I thought this was a very interesting form of collaboration and much more direct than something we have in America. SHTPs sense of innovation in high technology truly impressed me and I was glad to have visited their facilities.