Global AI competition
On May 25, Saigon AI Hub (SAIH) officially announced OneVoice AI Challenge, a global technology competition for researchers, AI engineers (artificial intelligence), students and startup communities to develop real-time bilingual translation solutions based on hardware devices, instead of relying on Internet connection.
SAIH is the first open AI research space in Ho Chi Minh City co-operated by VNG Group Joint Stock Company (VNG Group) and Vietnam National University Ho Chi Minh City (VNU-HCM).
According to the roadmap, the contest will open applications from May 22 to June 22. Participating teams will go through online rounds including registration and technical dossier submission, prototype development to live rounds including practical testing before entering the final round held in Ho Chi Minh City in November 2026 with a total prize value of up to 1.3 billion VND.
Within the framework of the competition, participating teams will develop operating prototypes on handheld edge devices (Edge AI), processing language directly on hardware. The competition focuses on three popular language pairs in the region: Vietnamese – English, Vietnamese – Chinese and Vietnamese – Korean, to support natural bilingual conversations with low latency, even in environments without Internet connection and cloud computing.
The competition is an open platform for the global AI community. Researchers, startups and engineers from many countries can jointly test new approaches for highly practical Edge AI applications.
Reducing communication barriers in a limited connected environment
Language barriers are still a major challenge for the labor force in many Asian economies, including Vietnam. In the manufacturing, construction and logistics industries, the ability to communicate quickly and accurately directly affects the productivity, training efficiency and labor safety of multinational forces.
However, many working environments today still lack stable connection infrastructure, causing the effectiveness of cloud-based translation tools to be significantly limited.
Through OneVoice AI Challenge, the organizers expect to promote AI solutions capable of supporting multilingual communication directly on the device, thereby helping the application of AI in the actual working environment become more stable and accessible.
Promoting AI through multilateral cooperation
OneVoice AI Challenge gathers many parties in the regional AI R&D ecosystem. In particular, Qualcomm - the world's leading semiconductor corporation - participates as a strategic technology partner, providing hardware platforms and technical support for the entire program.
Mr. ST Liew, Vice President cum President of Qualcomm for Southeast Asia, Australia and New Zealand, added: “Through initiatives like OneVoice AI Challenge, we expect to accompany the technology community to find AI application solutions on devices (on-device AI), not only solving communication problems and improving actual productivity, but also having the ability to replicate to create positive changes”.
Initiatives such as OneVoice AI Challenge are expected to promote the process of bringing AI from research to practical application. Connecting technology businesses, research organizations and the development community also creates conditions for AI solutions to be quickly tested, completed and put into practice.
In the long term, platforms such as Saigon AI Hub are expected to contribute to making Vietnam a newly emerging AI R&D center in the region, attracting international researchers and engineers to solve practical problems of Asia.
