Keeping Vietnam Language Alive Via Computer : Software: Two immigrants have established rival companies in Orange County to do just that.
The two men were strangers in Vietnam.
By coincidence, Nguyen Viet and Ho Thanh Viet escaped from Saigon on the day it fell, April 30, 1975. Along with thousands of other South Vietnamese, they fled the Communist takeover aboard U.S. Navy ships.
Both men eventually made their way to the United States, where they sought to carve out a new existence in an unfamiliar land by learning to program computers.
And those first steps led both men to start their own businesses, enterprises they now hope will help their native land, still recovering from the decades of warfare.
Nguyen and Ho, who go by the nicknames Victor and John, operate rival software companies here that publish Vietnamese-language software. Nguyen’s company is called VN Labs, after his initials, while Ho’s firm is dubbed VNI, for Vietnam International.
Their software, they believe, can make the Vietnamese language live on in exile.
“This is not a business 100%,” Ho explained. “It is a service.”
With the normalization of U.S. trade relations with Vietnam on the horizon, the Orange County men--and other Vietnamese software publishers--share the hope that someday such software might grease the wheels of modernization in their native land.
“There is a big potential for the software to modernize the Vietnamese system and bring up literacy rates in Vietnam,” said Do Yen, publisher of Nguoi Viet, a Vietnamese-language daily newspaper in Westminster with a circulation of 12,000.
The Vietnamese use a system of writing known as quoc ngu , a Roman alphabet with a variety of tone and accent marks. Introduced by European missionaries in the 17th Century, it has largely replaced earlier writing based on Chinese ideograms.
Do said his newspaper uses both VN Labs and VNI software, saving his staff from the painstaking typesetting process.
Employees would print the Roman characters of the text and then write in the tone marks and accents of the language’s 134 distinct characters. It was a business ripe for computerization.
Nguyen, 42, who served in the South Vietnamese navy, arrived in Torrance virtually penniless after spending time in a series of refugee camps.
He started his company after trying a number of jobs, including pumping gas and working as an electronics technician. He also worked for various aerospace companies and did computer programming on the side after earning an engineering degree from Loyola Marymount University in 1979.
While working as an engineer at Teledyne, Nguyen was shown an astrology program written in Vietnamese by a friend. But without the accents and tone marks, he recalls, it had lost its original meaning.
“I started work on a program. I didn’t think it could be a business at first, so I kept my job,” he said.
In 1983, Nguyen created a software program that alters a standard IBM computer keyboard so that a combination of keys can produce on-screen the tone marks and accents required in quoc ngu.
By 1987, Nguyen was able to quit his regular job and work full time on VN Labs. In 1990, he launched a version of his program for Windows 3.0, the popular graphics-based system that has become a new standard in the publishing industry.
Ho, 37, took a little longer to get established in his new country, arriving here at 18 with no knowledge of English.
His family did not make it out of Vietnam. A brother was killed during the war. Nine other siblings live in the city of Nha Trang, near the former Cam Ranh Bay U.S. naval base. His efforts to bring them over have failed. His parents have died since the war ended.
“In my dream, I hope one day I’m successful in this business and can bring them here,” he said.
Ho studied electrical engineering at Cal State Fullerton and received a degree in 1985. He worked at various computer companies and in his spare time mulled over the idea of a Vietnamese-language computer.
He officially launched VNI software in 1987 and has been working on the business full time since 1988.
The similarities in name, programs and marketing styles of the two businesses have led to some confusion among customers. The companies have jockeyed for the same customers, particularly among publishers of Vietnamese-language newspapers and books.
But there are some distinctions in their strategies that have allowed both companies to become successful.
Nguyen’s company has branched out. Altogether, the company’s Diplomat Software series now includes 36 languages. Several more languages are in the works, Nguyen said.
Newport Beach-based VN Labs markets the software to diplomats and government agencies--including the State Department and the Pentagon--and he advertises in mainstream personal computer magazines.
Nguyen said he believes the Vietnamese-language market is too small to focus upon exclusively. He thinks a Russian-language program, written by a Russian emigre employed by VN Labs, will generate even more sales.
“Every computer that we send to Russia will have Diplomat Software,” says customer Victor Ivashin, a manager with Andrew VSAT, a microwave technology company in Fremont. “That’s because Russians can type on it in their own language.”
Ho, while he works to develop software packages in additional languages, has focused on sales in the Vietnamese community in Westminster’s Little Saigon, where his six-member company is based.
“We love the mother language here,” Ho said. “It is rich and better, and we want the people in our community to have a chance to learn computers.”
Ho is preparing to launch his own Windows version of the Vietnamese-language software. He is writing programs that would make it simpler to program karaoke, or sing-along machines, to play songs in a variety of languages.
It now takes eight hours to program one song on a karaoke machine so that the words (in several languages) scroll across the screen to the beat of recorded music. Ho says his program will cut that time to 20 minutes.
Nguyen sold about 10,000 copies of the Diplomat Software series last year. Each package sells for about $145.
Ho says he has never made much money selling his software. He estimates he has sold 4,000 copies at prices ranging from $35 to $195 since his company began. The privately held companies do not disclose sales or profits.
“Victor (Nguyen) had the software first, but he has spent a lot of time away from our community, marketing worldwide,” said Kim Long, editor of Saigon Today, a weekly newspaper in Anaheim. “VNI has focused on doing business in Little Saigon. That was smart.”
Long, who uses VN Labs’ software, says the program reduces time and manpower.
Do, the publisher of Nguoi Viet, estimates there are 300 Vietnamese-language newspapers worldwide, many which use either VN Labs or VNI software.
Nguyen says he believes a broader product offering and constantly updated technology can give him an edge. He is also considering opening an office in Little Saigon to improve his marketing. Ho says the companies can coexist in their own niches.
Eventually, both companies would like to sell software in Vietnam, which has a population of 70 million. But they are also concerned about political issues and the country’s antiquated technology base. Few average citizens have the money to buy computers, Nguyen said.
“If the embargo lifts, investors will go in and then our products could be sold there. But it will be difficult . . . “ Ho said. “There is no law to protect copyrights--and human rights.”
