Pham Thanh, Founder and CEO of ViBIM
Pham Thanh is an architect who taught himself Revit in 2009 and founded ViBIM in Hanoi in 2014. He still leads the company's strategy and stays in direct contact with long-standing clients, some of whom he has visited in their own offices.
From architect to BIM practitioner
Thanh grew up in Thanh Hoa province, Vietnam, and studied architecture at Assumption University (ABAC) in Bangkok, graduating in 2008.
| Period | Role |
|---|---|
| 2008–2009 | 3D architect at SMEC Vietnam, where his interest in digital modeling began |
| 2009–2014 | Design architect at Constrexim ICC in Hanoi, rising to Vice Director of the Design Center |
| 2010–2012 | MBA at Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, alongside his job |
| 2014–present | Founder and CEO of ViBIM |
At Constrexim he started using Revit in 2009, before BIM had a settled definition in Vietnam, and by 2011 he had brought BIM processes into his design center's daily work.
Starting ViBIM
In October 2014 he left a senior design role to start a BIM outsourcing company for overseas clients, with three employees. He has described the decision as a bet on a change in the industry that few people around him took seriously at the time. Looking back, he says the courage to embrace that change is what he expects to define his career.
Because there was no global standard for Scan to BIM delivery, he built one for the company: modeling conventions, QC checks and process rules that now sit behind every ViBIM project. That framework is the backbone of our Scan to BIM Services today.
Work on national BIM standards
From 2014 to 2019 Thanh sat on Vietnam's official BIM Steering Committee under the Ministry of Construction. He contributed to the research and drafting of Vietnam's first official BIM Guidelines, published in 2017. Running a company and helping write a national standard at the same time gave him an unusual view of both the practice and the policy.
Credentials
- Bachelor's Degree in Architecture, Assumption University (ABAC), Bangkok, 2008
- MBA, Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management, 2012
- BIM Management Certificate, Singapore, 2014
- Professional Architecture Design Practice Certificate, Vietnam Ministry of Construction, 2013
- Professional Construction Project Investment Management Certificate, Vietnam Ministry of Construction, 2010
- Guest speaker, National Engineering 2018, Engineering Institute of Thailand
What has been built
Under his leadership ViBIM grew from three people to a team of 30 professionals and completed more than 1,000 projects, about 250,000 hours of modeling, for clients in the UK, Australia, the US and Canada. He also trained many of Vietnam's first-generation BIM engineers.
A modeling manager who has worked with ViBIM for over eight years, first in the UK and later in Australia, describes his leadership as methodical and long-term, grounded in the technical realities of modeling.
His stated goal for the company is simple: to become the first-choice partner in Scan to BIM while keeping its professional culture as it grows.
Read more about the company on the About page or meet the team he leads.