Foreign Firms Lead Investments in Vietnam’s Warehousing Sector

With global economy showing signs of recovery, warehousing sector in Vietnam remains the most attractive logistics segment in the country and poised for robust growth in the coming years by attracting significant investments, especially from foreign companies.

According to market research firm FiinGroup Vietnam, the foreign companies held a 75% share of the warehousing market last year. This growth is driven by increased demand for cold storage facilities, particularly from the seafood processing industry and fresh food sectors, which account for up to 70%-80% of the demand for cold storage in Vietnam.

By the end of 2023, Vietnam’s logistics industry was using nearly 3.9 million sq m of floor space. The annual growth rate from 2020 to 2023 was 23% and is expected to remain high in the next few years. Warehousing remains the most important field in Vietnam’s promising logistics segment, attracting both local and foreign investors, the report said.

Top Three

In fact, the top three companies – Singapore’s Mapletree, global logistics real estate firm GLP’s subsidiary SEA Logistic Partners and BW Industrial, a joint venture between the US investment company Warburg Pincus and local developer Becamex IDC, accounted for nearly 1.79 million sft or 46%, of the leasable modern warehouse space, FiinGroup said in a recent report.

Mapletree has been expanding its warehouse portfolio aggressively with mega logistics hubs in Bac Ninh, Hung Yen and Binh Duong provinces, with each containing 12-24 warehouses.

Furthermore, BW Industrial and NPL Logistics are two rising stars in modern warehouse market in Vietnam with 22 new warehouses in both the North and the South of Vietnam during between 2020-2022.

Domestic Companies Too

Not only foreign but even domestic enterprises are also expanding but on a much smaller scale, with the three largest, ICDST, NPL Logistics and Gemadept, having 172,000, 126,000, and 114,000 sq m of space.

“Driven by strong trade, manufacturing and retail, warehousing is the most attractive logistics segment and for the last four years, the supply of modern warehouse space has been growing by 23% annually, reaching 3.9 million sq m in 2023,” FiinGroup said in the report.

Another 25 warehouses are set to be completed before 2027, adding another 1.87 million sq m, it added.

FiinGroup is Vietnam’s leading provider of financial data analytics platforms, business information, market research and consulting, credit ratings, and other data-driven analytics services via Platform as a Service (PaaS), annual package, and on-call services.