After nearly nine years of implementing smart city development (since 2017), Ho Chi Minh City has achieved many remarkable results in its digital transformation process. A series of data platforms, operational centers, camera systems, online public services, etc., have been put into operation, contributing to changing the government's management methods and improving the quality of service for citizens.
However, the gap between a city with many technological applications and a truly smart city remains significant. Citizens still have to provide information multiple times when carrying out administrative procedures; data between agencies is not truly interconnected; many applications operate independently and lack connectivity; and traffic congestion, flooding, environmental pollution, and overloaded infrastructure remain unresolved. This shows that no matter how advanced the technology, it cannot create a smart city without changing the governance methods.
Therefore, the Ho Chi Minh City People's Committee's development of the Smart City Development Project for the period 2026-2030, with a vision to 2045, is considered a significant shift in development thinking. While the previous phase mainly focused on building a digital platform, the new phase aims for a higher goal: using data as the foundation for urban governance, artificial intelligence (AI) as a tool to support management, and citizen satisfaction as a measure of effectiveness.
The biggest difference in this project is that the city is no longer focusing on building more applications or investing in more technological equipment. Instead, the goal is to fundamentally change the way urban management is conducted, shifting from a model heavily reliant on experience to one based on data, predictive analytics, and artificial intelligence.
Ho Chi Minh City is striving to become a smart city.
According to the plan, data will become a strategic resource for the city. Instead of each department and agency managing its own data system as before, Ho Chi Minh City will build a unified data platform, standardize data architecture, develop a data exchange, and create highly accurate "data products" to serve management and administration as well as the needs of businesses and citizens.
Along with data, AI has been identified as a key technology in this new phase of development. The city will apply AI, big language modeling (LLM), big data analytics, and predictive tools to support leaders in making faster and more accurate decisions. Instead of simply reacting when incidents occur, authorities can anticipate risks such as traffic congestion, flooding, environmental pollution, hospital overcrowding, or pressure on urban infrastructure to proactively manage the situation.
Another noteworthy development is the creation of a digital twin model for urban areas. This model is considered a "digital replica" of the entire city, integrating spatial data, ground data, underground infrastructure data, aerial data, and real-time IoT sensor systems. This allows managers to simulate various urban development scenarios, assess the impact of each decision before implementation, mitigate risks, and optimize investment resources.
Simultaneously, the Intelligent Operations Center (IOC) will continue to be refined according to a standard model, connecting real-time data with departments, agencies, and local authorities. The IOC can be envisioned as the city's "digital brain," receiving and processing data from various fields such as transportation, planning, environment, health, education , and public security. Based on this data, the system will support city leaders in making faster, more accurate, and timely decisions.
The city clearly defines that a smart city must help citizens access public services more conveniently, travel more easily, live in a safer environment, and have better quality education and healthcare . Technology is only truly meaningful when it solves very specific problems of daily life.
To realize this plan, Ho Chi Minh City aims to achieve the following goals by 2030: 100% of public areas will be covered by free high-speed WiFi; 5G network coverage will reach 95% of the population, and 6G will be gradually piloted in key areas. In the field of digital government, 100% of administrative procedures and their results will be digitized; all eligible public services will be provided online throughout the entire process; 85% of applications will be processed online; 99% of citizens and businesses will be satisfied with using online public services; and 70% of adult citizens will have a digital signature or personal electronic signature.
Regarding transportation, the city aims to connect real-time data across the entire traffic light system on major arterial routes and key intersections to detect congestion and accidents early for flexible management; gradually shift public transportation to green energy; integrate electronic tickets and journey information on a unified platform; manage seaports using a digital platform; and install smart cameras on key roads and public areas to support crime prevention and improve emergency response efficiency.
The Ho Chi Minh City Police's Digital Citizen Service Station model is part of the smart city ecosystem.
In the healthcare sector, the goal is for 100% of the population to have electronic health records and for 100% of medical facilities to implement telemedicine. The education sector aims for 100% of students and teachers to have digital learning accounts; core learning materials to be digitized; educational institutions to apply AI; and the establishment of 1,000 digital schools. In the environmental sector, a centralized, real-time monitoring system for environmental, drainage, and wastewater data will be developed to provide early warning of pollution risks.
Citizens and businesses are not only beneficiaries but also identified as active participants in building smart cities. The project requires the development of two-way interactive channels so that citizens can report on issues, monitor the activities of public authorities, and contribute opinions to the urban governance process. This is also one of the important criteria for evaluating the maturity level of digital government.
According to the plan, Ho Chi Minh City aims to be among the top 50 smart cities in the world by 2030; become one of the three national-level smart city operations centers by 2035; achieve the highest level of maturity according to Vietnam's sustainable smart city criteria by 2045; and become a leading science , technology, and innovation center in the Asia-Pacific region.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Phuong Tuyen
Dieser Artikel ist neu veröffentlicht von / This article is republished from: Vietnam.vn, 02.08.2026
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