Outstanding IT products and services honoured at Sao Khue Awards 2018

This year’s awards ceremony marked the 15th anniversary of Sao Khue Awards, which have been hosted by the Vietnam Software and IT Services Association (VINASA) annually since 2003.

Speaking at the event, Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Minh Hong emphasised that his ministry highly appreciated the role and contribution of VINASA and the IT community nationwide for the development of the IT industry.

Over the past 15 years, Sao Khue has developed in terms of quantity and quality, creating a useful playground for the IT community and contributing to the building of Vietnam’s prestige IT brand name, as well as introducing the nation’s IT products and services to the international market, the Deputy Minister said.

Deputy Minister of Information and Communications Nguyen Minh Hong highly praises VINASA's initiative in launching new technological trends for the fourth industrial revolution in the Sao Khue 2018 Awards. (Photo: ictnews.vn)

According to VINASA, the Sao Khue Awards were launched in 2003 in the early stages of the nation’s IT industry, which had a revenue of approximately US$62 million and a labour force of about 5,000 engineers at the time.

So far, the software and services industry has grossed US$8.8 billion with more than 200,000 working engineers. The sector’s revenue has ballooned to over 1,000 times its size of 15 years ago. The winning products and solutions have been widely applied in all socio-economic sectors.

In 2018, the programme received 103 nominations from 80 organisations and enterprises nationwide. The organising board, with judges and experts from relevant ministries, sectors, and press agencies, has reviewed and decided to grant the awards to 51 software products and 22 IT services.

They also selected the Top 10 Sao Khue 2018, to recognise the ten best IT solutions, including the electronic banking programme BIDV iBank by the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam (BIDV), the e-export service from the FPT Software Company, and the e-medical record system ISOFHCARE by the ISOFH Technical Company, among others.

This year’s awards also recognised investment in research, development, and innovation in IT products, solutions, and services which prioritised new technology trends, such as AI, IoT, Big Data, robotic process automation, blockchains, virtual reality, augmented reality, and 3D printing.