Vietnamese boat person sets sail for home

Dame Silvia Cartwright, with President Tran Duc Luong (third left), is welcomed to Vietnam last month. Picture / Reuters

Mitchell Pham describes himself as the "black sheep" of his family. His mother, father, sister and brother are all engineers.

It is a tongue-in-cheek reference, however, as there is no way his parents would frown on his career path. Nevertheless, Pham, who launched software firm Augen as a fresh-faced graduate from Auckland University with four mates in 1993, stands out.

He is a risk-taker, an entrepreneur, with a knack for new ideas and the courage to follow through. It is a courage Pham, 34, exhibited at 12 when his parents put him in a boat then launched it into the South China Sea with 67 other Vietnamese refugees.

As supporters of the South Vietnamese Government during the Vietnam War, Pham's parents were outcasts under the post-war communist rule from the North.

They tried twice as a family to escape, in 1979 and 1980, and failed - the second time landing the men in a labour camp and the women and children in a minimum security prison.

By 1984, Pham's parents had scraped together enough money for one family member to escape. As the eldest of three children and with the prospect of being drafted into the Army - bound for battles against Cambodia and China - looming at 14, Pham was chosen.

It was a tough experience. After three days at sea in a 12.5m fishing vessel, the refugees came close to being rescued by a Swedish holiday liner. But the crew had second thoughts and abandoned the vessel.

Eventually, the refugees were rescued by an oil-rig operation off the coast of Indonesia and taken to a UN refugee camp. Fifteen months later, Pham and his uncle, who was also on the boat, were accepted by the New Zealand Government for immigration under the annual humanitarian quota.

It was a defining moment for Pham, who describes himself as "born in Vietnam; made in New Zealand".

In the mid-80s, Auckland was a fairly homogeneous community.

"If you wanted to do anything, you had to integrate," Pham says.

It's not a decision he regrets, however, nor do his business partners, two of whom are also immigrants, from South Korea and Germany.

"The Augen team were two Kiwis and three Kiwi wannabes," Pham says. The quintet met in 1990 at Auckland University, where they were studying business information and computer science. In August 1993, they founded Augen New Zealand, to develop a software package that would deliver the school curriculum online. But the concept proved too far ahead of the market.

Undeterred, the group - comprising Pham, Aucklander Andrew Flint, Peter Vile from Feilding, Robert Kang from South Korea and Stephan Koch from Germany - returned to their studies and launched into designing corporate software.

By the end of 1993, Augen had its first customer, Douglas Pharmaceuticals - one of the fastest-growing pharmaceutical groups in Australasia. It was a steep learning curve. "We were naive and enthusiastic but determined to build a business," Pham says.

The quintet were also at a similar life stage, a key factor in the longevity of the partnership - which so far has seen just one member, Flint, leave the company, in 2000.

Augen's customers include corporate heavyweights such as ASB Bank, AMP, BT Funds Management, Fletcher Steel, Pacific Retail Group and NZI Insurance.

The company is also a partner in several software startups, including internet security firm EntriSentri and personal training firm Optimal-Portal.

Augen has 20 staff and expects its Australasian turnover to grow by 500 per cent in the next five years.

A key part of the growth strategy is expanding Augen's resource base into Asia. With a severe shortage of local software talent, the group started looking overseas in the late 1990s - a move that coincided with Pham's first trip home to his family in 14 years.

"Vietnam and China are the two countries in Asia right now that presented the most opportunities for all industries, not just IT," Pham says.

Vietnam is expanding at over 7 per cent a year, and that - coupled with a high literacy rate and imminent entry into the World Trade Organisation - makes it ideal for outsourcing.

Governor-General Dame Silvia Cartwright opened Augen's first office in Ho Chi Minh City last month. The office has four staff, but Pham hopes the workforce will be 200 strong in three to five years, with 20 per cent in New Zealand, 80 per cent in Vietnam.

The aim is to retain the management structure and front end of the business here, while tapping into Vietnam's vast supply of graduates to provide back office support for much larger projects, here and across the Tasman.

Augen's medium-term goal is to use Vietnam as a base to launch into more affluent Asian markets such as Japan, Malaysia, Singapore and South Korea.

Longer term, Pham sees Vietnam, with its 80 million-plus population, as a potential gold mine.

"Vietnam is hungry for products and services and intellectual properties and everything a Western, developed country can offer.

"What makes New Zealand one of the better choices is that we are not only a Western country, we are one of the most innovative Western countries."

- NZPA