Map4D, a mapping platform created by Vietnamese engineers was introduced at a conference earlier this week. The technology is expected to play a role in expediting Vietnam’s digital transformation.
Developed by IoTLink, Map4D is available on the web as well as on smartphones and tablets, offering an interface similar to Google Maps. In addition to real-time navigation functions and weather updates, the service displays many well-known places of interest in Vietnam in the form of three-dimensional images.
According to a news report, Map4D can also be easily integrated across many fields such as e-commerce, tourism, construction, natural resources and environmental management, urban management, agriculture, and transport.
Since the service is made entirely by Vietnamese engineers and its data is stored in Vietnam, it ensures a high degree of national security. The platform was awarded second prize in a contest seeking national digital transformation solutions, known as Viet Solutions 2020, as organised by the Ministry of Information and Communications (MIC).
The introduction of Map4D is part of a series of events held by the ministry to promote local digital products aiming to realise the national digital transformation programme towards 2025.
In another move following the programme, the government recently held a symposium themed “the press with the new requirements in the context of digital transformation”. Experts, leaders, and managers from press and media agencies as well as journalists participated in discussions to build a basic foundation of journalism theory in the context of the modern digital transformation.
They also offered suggestions on how to solve problems to increase the competitiveness of the regular media with different types of social media in the current era, while discussing the expectations and adaptations agencies, organisations and businesses expect from the media to coordinate in the process.
Reports at the seminar showed a unified view on the urgent need for the media to make fundamental changes from its content creation, editorial modelling, and human resources development to its vision, strategy, thinking, and methods of leadership and management.
An expert explained that the current digital revolution and Industry 4.0 both bring about great opportunities for the media in terms of its transformation and development, as well as unprecedented challenges for the press in fulfilling its mission. Digital transformation is building digital operating models and making the transition, in which the process of changing takes place comprehensively, from top leaders to all members of agencies, organisations, and enterprises, to effectively operate.
Discussing this issue, participants at the workshop agreed that it is necessary to move towards the innovation models which focus on building the converged multimedia newsroom model at press agencies, such as in the media centre of Quang Ninh province or the multimedia model of the People’s Army Newspaper, to operate effectively alongside the impacts of digital transformation.
Additionally, for the converged model to work effectively, it is necessary to innovate in the organisation of production of journalism as well as communication products, in particular a strategy for training human resources to meet the practical requirements of the changing face of journalism and media sectors.
Emphasising the human factor in the digital transformation of the press, Prof. Dr. Dinh Xuan Dung, from the Central Council for the Theory and Criticism of Literature, said that the most important thing is training, building, and fostering a team of leaders, press managers, and reporters with an adequate level of vision, ability and creativity to grasp digital transformation opportunities in time, leveraging this process and the modern technologies of the digital age to serve readers.
Delegates at the seminar also proposed developing and completing the planning of a system of press agencies in Vietnam to meet current requirements in the context of the digital transformation, alongside solutions to improve both governance and innovative content, helping perfect the converged newsroom model.