Vietnam urges phased entry for HKU’s proposed Hanoi campus

International business education in Vietnam offers HKU an entry point into an existing market: joint programmes already concentrate on economics and business.

At a Hanoi meeting on 20 October, deputy prime minister Le Tien Chau welcomed the University of Hong Kong (HKU) Business School’s campus proposal. He proposed starting with joint training programmes at Vietnamese institutions or pilot courses before expanding enrolment and proceeding with campus investment and licensing.

That sequence gives the expansion a sensible commercial discipline. Paid courses can reveal which customers the school can attract and the teaching resources they require. A permanent campus would turn those choices into longer commitments to premises and staffing, so early enrolment needs to inform the scale of investment.

Business degrees enter an occupied market

Vietnam’s Ministry of Education and Training says joint training programmes are concentrated largely in economics and business, while movement towards science, technology, engineering and mathematics has been slow. HKU would therefore enter a subject area where international partnerships already operate, with differentiation carrying more weight than the novelty of foreign provision.

For degree students, the commercial proposition rests on the qualification and the experience attached to it. Recognition, teaching quality and access to employers need to justify the fee. Local delivery can appeal to applicants who want an international education while remaining at home, but converting that appeal into enrolment requires a clearly defined programme. Admissions requirements also shape the pool of eligible applicants. RMIT and BUV require English proficiency, while VinUni considers academic achievements, extracurricular activities and interviews. For a prospective entrant, recruitment and academic preparation belong in the same commercial calculation: attracting interest is only the beginning of building a cohort able to complete the course.

Recruiting students who would otherwise study abroad brings spending into local provision. Winning applicants from existing international programmes redistributes it. Domestic university partners would gain a potential new product, while also taking on negotiations over admissions, teaching responsibilities and their share of tuition revenue.

Tuition sets the addressable market

Historical fees illustrate the range of alternatives. VnExpress’s figures for 2024–2025 put RMIT University at 335 million Vietnamese dong a year and British University Vietnam at 154 million to over 252 million dong, depending on the programme. Both operated foreign programmes. These are broad institutional benchmarks, not business-degree price comparisons.

The same account placed FPT University Hanoi’s annual tuition at 86.1 million dong for all majors. HKU’s price would define how far its recruitment reaches across that spread. Scholarships can broaden access, though the financial model has to work on tuition collected after awards, alongside the cost of delivering the promised teaching.

A premium price creates a demanding balance between intake and service. Small classes may strengthen the student experience while increasing teaching cost per participant; larger cohorts improve cost recovery but require enough suitable applicants. Partner delivery makes it possible to adjust that balance before campus overheads add pressure to fill places.

Corporate courses need their own revenue case

HKU has an existing connection to professional training in Vietnam. Its representative office has organised training in AI management and digital transformation for a high-level National Assembly delegation. Chau’s proposed cooperation areas also included artificial intelligence, data science, green finance and financial technology, alongside business administration and other fields. Since 2022, the representative office has helped secure more than $4.7 million in scholarships for Vietnamese students. Chau proposed increasing the number and value of scholarships, priority admission arrangements for outstanding young scientists and students sent by Vietnam for training, and support for training Vietnamese lecturers and education managers. That agenda gives the partnership an institutional purpose alongside its commercial ambitions. Scholarship access and lecturer development would need space in the operating model alongside fee-paying recruitment.

Executive education needs a separate sales model from degrees. Employers buy relevance to a business problem and a format that fits working schedules. A course can attract corporate interest without generating demand for a longer qualification, so each product needs its own pricing and recruitment assumptions.

For corporate training providers, a potential entrant creates pressure to defend client relationships and course relevance. For HKU, repeat bookings would be commercially stronger than a succession of isolated engagements: they would make faculty allocation easier and reduce the effort needed to sell each course. Corporate revenue can support expansion, but its contribution depends on repeatable delivery.

Licensing and faculty shape the investment sequence

Chau proposed joint programmes or pilot courses to assess demand and gradually expand enrolment before campus procedures and investment. Earlier reforms under Decree No. 124/2024/ND-CP introduced branch-campus provisions requiring parent-institution training and accreditation standards, with facilities and faculty meeting Vietnamese requirements. Political support helps the proposal advance; permission to operate remains a separate step. The decree also requires foreign higher education partners to be reputable, accredited and authorised to provide training and award degrees in the relevant fields in their home country. Institutions must publish information on curricula, accreditation results, foreign teachers, international students and assessment methods on their websites. Partner delivery therefore carries academic and administrative obligations from the outset. A phased approach needs resources for compliance and student information alongside teaching, even before permanent premises become the central investment decision.

The delivery model therefore needs to develop alongside the academic offer. Visiting faculty, locally recruited lecturers and teaching shared with a partner create different cost structures. Phasing reduces the danger of building capacity ahead of demand, though a pilot still needs teaching quality close enough to the intended campus product to guide investment.

The largest commercial risk is committing permanent costs before repeat recruitment supports them. Firm programme permissions, a workable partner agreement and sustained paid enrolment would strengthen the case for expansion. Chau also called for HKU faculty to teach and supervise doctoral candidates in Vietnam, alongside joint research and co-authored scientific publications.