HANOI, March 17 (Reuters) – SpaceX, Netflix and Boeing are amongst the businesses joining the “most significant-ever” U.S. company mission to Vietnam subsequent week to talk about investment and sales possibilities in the booming Southeast Asian nation, the organiser mentioned.

Extra than 50 businesses, like defence, pharmaceutical and tech firms, will participate in the mission organised by the US-ASEAN Company Council, an market physique, according to a list noticed by Reuters.

The delegation is a sign of increasing interest in the international manufacturing hub, which is benefiting from a shift away from China amid Sino-U.S. trade friction.

Vietnam, with a population of one hundred million folks, also has a swiftly-increasing customer marketplace as its middle class expands.

“This is the most significant-ever mission in Vietnam,” mentioned Vu Tu Thanh, the US-ASEAN Company Council’s representative in the nation, noting that the physique had been organising these events for 3 decades.

Streaming giant Netflix (NFLX.O), which Reuters final month reported was preparing to open an workplace in Vietnam, is amongst the businesses joining the trip. Netflix did not respond to a request for comment.

Aerospace suppliers Boeing (BA.N), Lockheed Martin (LMT.N) and Bell (TXT.N) will hold meetings with state-owned Vietnamese defence procurement businesses, Thanh told Reuters, adding that it was the 1st time in about a decade that safety firms had decided to join the annual mission to Vietnam.

In December, the exact same businesses held talks with Vietnamese government officials about the feasible sale of helicopters and drones, as the nation seeks new suppliers and the Ukraine conflict strains the capabilities of Russia, for decades Vietnam’s principal military companion.

“Helicopters is one particular of the issues the businesses hope to sell to the Vietnamese,” Thanh mentioned, though he cautioned that defence offers took time to be completed and no instant breakthrough was anticipated.

Boeing mentioned in a statement that its discussions with officials would concentrate on its increasing partnership with Vietnam and methods to strengthen the country’s aviation and defence capabilities.

Lockheed Martin and Bell did not respond to requests for comment.

The majority of the businesses joining the company mission currently have a company or manufacturing presence in Vietnam, like Apple (AAPL.O), Coca-Cola (KO.N) and PepsiCo (PEP.O), Thanh mentioned, with some preparing to expand it.

Some businesses are also coming to get a far better sense of the political scenario right after current turmoil in the Communist-Celebration led nation, like the resignation of the president in January, Thanh added.

Participants will have meetings with Vietnam’s best political and regulatory leadership, like with Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh.

Thanh mentioned some businesses had been interested in Vietnam as a manufacturing hub and in offering solutions to increasingly wealthy buyers at a time when financial development reached far more than eight% final year.

Amongst them is SpaceX, which is searching to sell its satellite net solutions to Vietnam and other nations in the area, Thanh mentioned. SpaceX did not respond to a request for comment.

The mission will also involve semiconductors businesses, pharmaceutical giants Pfizer (PFE.N) and Johnson &amp Johnson (PFE.N), healthcare device maker Abbott (ABT.N), monetary firms Visa (V.N) and Citibank (C.N), net and cloud businesses Meta (META.O) and Amazon Net Solutions (AMZN.O), the list showed.

Reporting by Francesco Guarascio Editing by Jamie Freed

Our Requirements: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Francesco Guarascio

Thomson Reuters

Francesco leads a group of reporters in Vietnam that covers best monetary and political news in the speedy-increasing southeast Asian nation with a concentrate on provide chains and manufacturing investments in a number of sectors, like electronics, semiconductors, automotive and renewables. Just before Hanoi, Francesco worked in Brussels on EU affairs. He was also element of Reuters core international group that covered the COVID-19 pandemic and participated in investigations into dollars laundering and corruption in Europe. He is an eager traveler, constantly keen to place on a backpack to discover new areas.