The joint venture partners said Sunday that the smart city will span 272 hectares in the northern district of Dong Anh, located halfway between Noi Bai International Airport and the city center.

Project construction is set to start next year with 7,000 apartments and houses. When complete, the smart city will adopt 5G, face recognition, blockchain and other advanced technologies.

The project will consist of five phases. In the first phase, the joint venture will build a residential area that up to 25,000 people can occupy in 2022.

Office buildings and commercial facilities will be constructed in the second phase. All five phases are set to be finished in 2028.

The city will tap into a metro line planned between downtown Hanoi and the Noi Bai airport.

Sumitomo operates three industrial parks in the northern Vietnam which host about 190 companies, most of which are Japanese.

BRG is a major operator of golf courses and hotels in Vietnam. It is also involved in the finance and retail sectors.

The company will invest over JPY14 billion ($130 million) in the Thang Long Industrial Park II in the northern province of Hung Yen, 30 kilometers to the east of Hanoi, expanding its size by 52 percent to 526 hectares, it said in a statement Friday.

With the company having reached an agreement with Hung Yen authorities, construction is set to start in 2021 and sales of lots in 2022. When finished, the park will be one of the largest Japanese-run industrial parks in the country.

Sumitomo also plans to spend another JPY5 billion ($46 million) to double the size of its Thang Long Industrial Park III to 213 hectares next year, the Nikkei Asian Review reported.

The park, covering 104 hectares, is located in Vinh Phuc Province, 54 kilometers to the north of Hanoi and was completed last November.

Sumitomo originally planned to sell out the first phase lots by 2022. But due to unanticipated demand, the lots are likely be sold out by 2021, the Nikkei report said.

These are two of three industrial parks in Vietnam that Sumitomo has been operating since 1997. The three industrial parks currently host about 190 companies, 90 percent of which are Japanese manufacturers.

The expansion announcement by Sumitomo comes on the heels of reports that Japanese firms are seeking to expand their opertions in Vietnam.

A survey released by the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO) released earlier this year showed that 70 percent of Japanese firms in Vietnam were considering expanding their business here, the highest ratio among six Asian countries polled.

As of August 20, Japan was the second largest foreign investor in Vietnam with a total registered capital of $58.2 billion, behind South Korea at $64.9 billion.

SSJ Consulting Vietnam Llc, a company in which Sumitomo Corp owns a 51 percent stake, has acquired a 10 percent stake in Gemadept Corp, according to the Ho Chi Minh Stock Exchange.

SSJ Consulting was established recently by Sumitomo and two other Japanese companies.

Sumitomo operates three industrial parks near Hanoi and owns a logistics company in the country, while Gemadept operates six ports and handles 1.7 million containers a year.

Stock brokerage MBS said in a recent report that Vietnam would see more demand for logistics services since exports are set to grow by 10 percent a year for the next three to five years.

Last year the country’s ports handled 524.7 million tons of goods, up 19 percent from 2017, according to the Vietnam Maritime Administration.

Vietnam has 1,600 ships with a total capacity of 7.8 million tons, the fourth highest in Southeast Asia, the report added.