SMEs should improve capacity to lure venture capital: economists

Foreign venture capital funds have shown their interest in the Vietnamese market. (Photo: VNA)

Vietnamese small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) should better their management capacity and business strategies so as to draw capital from both domestic and foreign investment funds who are holding hundreds of billions of USD, economists have said.

The funds are able to provide SMEs with effective financial solutions, they said, elaborating instead of investing in financial tools, they are targeting unlisted companies and listed ones who are planning to withdraw their stocks from the market to engage in the firms’ management and business growth.

The funds commit at least five- to ten-year investment, experts said.

Last month, the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry received a delegation of 14 world and region’s leading multi-national investment funds who came to seek investment opportunities.

Along with large funds such as VinaCapital and Mekong Capital, there is an increasing number of foreign venture capital funds expressing interest in the Vietnamese market.

However, most of the Vietnamese firms have not been well aware of the funds while their poor management and foreign language proficiency as well as limited understanding of the financial market’s potential are hindering them in seeking investment, said Tran Thanh Hai, a specialist from Bac A Commercial Joint Stock Bank.

Besides, the SMEs need to prove their capacity, technology and business vision, according to Hai. Once getting long-term capital from investment funds, they will have motive to invest in long-term values like digitalisation in management and business and automation in production./.