Trends in the international science and technology cooperation to 2020 and opportunities for Vietnam
Abstract The paper focuses on analyzing the emerging trends in international cooperation in science and technology (S&T) to 2020 and opportunities for Vietnam. Firstly, the authors analyze the reasons of the development of international S&T cooperation in the past years, including motivation from government, business and the changes in global scope. The main content of the article highlights the key trends of international S&T cooperation in terms of groups of countries based on their S&T capacity, collaboration partners involving in the research of S&T, fields and forms of cooperation. Specifically, they are: (i) the developed countries will continue to lead the world in international S&T cooperation but some Asian countries like China and India are emerging and actively participating in this process in recent years; (ii) MNCs are active actors in S&T cooperation activities, but cooperation is still taking place primarily among research institutes and academia; (iii) development research continues to be the main field of cooperation; (iv) non-equity technology alliances is still the most popular form of cooperation; (v) cooperation through transferring, licensing or franchising intellectual property rights like patented, unpatented techniques and trademarks becomes more and more popular, in which developing countries are the main importers with the aim of acquiring S&T for economic development. Based on those analyses of cooperation trends in the world and the international S&T cooperation policy of Vietnamese government, the authors identify the opportunities for Vietnam to promote cooperation in S&T. International cooperation in science and technology (S&T) has played an important role in socio-economic development of Vietnam in the current period, contributing significantly to the acquisition of new knowledge and innovation of the world, strengthening scientific and technological potential of the country. The S&T Development Strategy towards 2010 identified international integration is one of four key solutions and also one of four key tasks of Vietnam. The S&T Development Strategy for the period of 2011-2020 continues to consider the positive and proactive international integration of S&T as a key solution to help Vietnam basically become an industrialized country towards modernization by 2020. Thus, determining the trends of international S&T cooperation is essential for Vietnam to shape policies to exploit the opportunities from these trends. In the 21st century, major changes in the world have contributed to shape the trends of international S&T cooperation in the direction of further development with the emergence of some Asian countries, changes in collaboration partners, fields and forms of cooperation. I. The reasons of development of international S&T cooperation International S&T cooperation includes (i) cooperation activities between research entities from different countries to jointly conduct research, invent, design and examine S&T, but these are still independent entities and do not lead to the establishment of a new entity; (ii) establishment of research networks or international research centers, which usually operate through foreign direct investment (FDI) by multinational corporations (MNCs); (iii) the exchange or sharing of research results, the application of scientific and technological achievements into practice through trade, exchange licenses and franchise (1). International cooperation...
