U.S. tariffs on Vietnamese goods have changed three times this year, and Yap Kwong Weng, CEO of the $300 million Vietnam SuperPort logistics hub, is candid about what that means. "Companies now have stopped looking at stability," he says. "Now they are planning for uncertainty."

The tariff record explains why. Vietnamese goods entered 2026 at 20%, set under the interim trade framework Washington and Hanoi agreed in October 2025. In February, the Supreme Court struck down the reciprocal tariffs President Donald Trump imposed in April 2025 as unlawful; Trump responded with a global 10% tariff on all imports. Since July, most Vietnamese goods carry a 12.5% duty, following a U.S. Section 301 investigation into forced labor enforcement. More change is likely — either through ongoing U.S.-Vietnam trade negotiations or further American probes into industrial overcapacity and intellectual property protections.

What is SuperPort betting on?

SuperPort is a joint venture between Singapore's YCH Group, a family-owned logistics company, and T&T Group, a Vietnamese conglomerate. Its 83-hectare hub in Phu Tho province, north of Hanoi, sits on the corridors linking Vietnam's electronics manufacturing belt to the Chinese border, where most components originate. The model integrates road, rail, air and sea transit into a single service, so an exporter taps one predictable route rather than four separate modes.

The air cargo terminal is already operational, and Yap claims monthly revenue has increased fivefold since July. Customers include FedEx, major global forwarders, and top electronics and AI hardware companies. The terminal handles consumer electronics, AI server racks and networking gear — freight valuable enough for air cargo and sensitive enough to require TAPA security certification. Yap's operating rule, he says, has been to be "the most trusted first."

The core wager: that Vietnam can graduate from routine final assembly to a genuine logistics and value-added base. Two forces will decide it. One is Washington, which buys roughly a third of all Vietnamese exports. The other is Hanoi's ability to build the infrastructure, energy and skills to sustain rapid growth.

How fast is Vietnam's economy growing?

Vietnam's GDP grew 9.95% in the third quarter of 2026 — the fastest pace in four years — putting Hanoi within reach of its 10% target for the full year. That beats last year's 8% growth despite trade uncertainty and disruption from the Iran war. Yap calls it a "super normal" economy: annoyances in slower economies become real barriers in one growing this fast.

Exports drive the expansion. Vietnam exported almost $500 billion worth of goods in the first ten months of the year, and runs a $140 billion trade surplus with the U.S. so far this year. The country has slotted into "China plus one" supply chains: Chinese components cross the border, Samsung and Foxconn factories assemble them, and finished products ship to the U.S., Europe and Asia.

The costs add up. Logistics runs between 16% and 20% of Vietnam's GDP; Hanoi wants that below 12% by 2030. Yap attributes the costs to administration, customs and transport fees, borne by exporters or passed to consumers. "Smarter infrastructure," in his view, is the only way down.

Can Vietnam fix its infrastructure and energy gaps?

Both Vietnam and China are pouring billions into integration:

• Vietnam is spending $11 billion on the Lao Cai–Hanoi–Haiphong rail line, linking China's rail network at the northern border to Haiphong's deep-water port on a standard-gauge line.
• Ho Chi Minh City's stretched Tan Son Nhat airport is being replaced by the new Long Thanh airport, shifting more cargo capacity to southern Vietnam.
• China opened the 134-kilometer Pinglu Canal in September, giving its industrial southwest a direct water route to the sea — south into the Gulf of Tonkin, not east to Guangzhou — cutting more than 560 kilometers and, by Beijing's estimates, up to 30% of logistics costs for ships of up to 5,000 tonnes.

Energy remains a bottleneck. Some provinces have seen power shutdowns despite heavy investment in generation, including renewables. Estimates of Vietnam's financing gap run as large as $200 billion; other assessments put the power sector's needs at $142 billion by 2030. "There is a bankability problem right now," Yap says.

Washington is also watching. Parts of the Trump administration suspect Chinese companies use minimal value-added activity in Vietnam to earn a "made in Vietnam" label and dodge steeper Chinese tariffs. Last year's interim agreement set a 40% tariff on goods deemed transshipped from China, though enforcement details were never spelled out. Yap frames the question from a Vietnam-based perspective: "What is important is how the goods are being handled securely, the quality, and where the value goes. Does the value stay onshore? Is it where Vietnamese managers and companies grow, or the value goes offshore?"

Vietnam targets high-income status by 2045 and wants new technology to contribute 6% of GDP by 2030, driven by local players like Viettel and FPT. Yap argues that shift requires investing in engineering, automation, semiconductor packaging and logistics skills.

What happens if the ground shifts again?

Yap's path to the role is unusual: more than a decade in Singapore's armed forces including U.S. Navy Seal training, a first degree finished at 30, business leadership roles in Southeast Asian emerging markets, and consulting stints at KPMG and EY-Parthenon. He worked in Myanmar before the 2021 coup set that country's opening back a generation, an experience that now shapes his Vietnam calculus. "Infrastructure depends on confidence from investors," he says. "I remain very optimistic about Vietnam. But I'm never complacent about it." His summary: "Frontier optimism is not a strategy."

SuperPort is building for the uncertainty rather than against it. Customers ask him three questions: "Who controls the data? Who verifies the origin? And what are the routes that can be rerouted so that one storage location can go to another storage location?" His answer is a network: four ports across Southeast Asia by 2030, including the 130-hectare Cambodia SuperPort in Kampong Speu near Phnom Penh, connected back into Vietnam through a planned Tay Ninh hub on the Cambodian border.

Tariffs may change a fourth or fifth time this year. Yap keeps his focus on what they cannot alter: "For now, I think Vietnam has the momentum."