Go to main content
 
Speech by SITI at HKUST Industry Engagement Day: Innovation and Technology Showcase (English only)
******************************************************************************************
     Following is the speech by the Secretary for Innovation, Technology and Industry, Professor Sun Dong, at the HKUST Industry Engagement Day: Innovation and Technology Showcase today (November 7):
    
Nancy (President of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), Professor Nancy Ip), Tim (Vice-President for Research and Development of the HKUST, Professor Tim Cheng), distinguished guests, ladies and gentlemen,
 
     Good morning. I am so happy to join you all here today at the HKUST Industry Engagement Day. I would like to express my appreciation to Nancy and your team for organising this event, providing an excellent platform for leaders and experts across industries to exchange views on driving Hong Kong's innovation and technology (I&T) development.
 
     I am very excited to learn that HKUST has done such excellent work in the innovation and entrepreneurship development, in addition to academic excellence in basic research. Over the past many years, HKUST has more than 300 industrial collaborations, more than 1 600 active start-ups, providing 400 billion Hong Kong dollars value added, and created nine unicorns. May I utilise this opportunity to congratulate HKUST for such remarkable achievements. You are creating a milestone for the university in Hong Kong.
 
     Indeed, it is a very good timing for us to get together and explore collaboration opportunities. Just a few weeks ago, the Chief Executive delivered the first Policy Address of this term of Government in which I&T is one of its spotlights. We are committed to implementing those new measures as announced under the Policy Address to chart Hong Kong in moving full steam towards our vision of an international I&T centre.
 
     Of these, we have earmarked $10 billion to launch a new funding scheme, namely "Research, Academic and Industry Sectors One‑plus Scheme", RAISe+ Scheme in short, next year to support commercialisation of R&D (research and development) outcomes by university research teams which have good potential to become I&T start-ups on a matching basis. We hope to incentivise through this scheme more collaboration among industry, academic and research sectors to push forward the "1 to N" transformation of more impactful and outstanding R&D outcomes and the industry development.
 
     I would also like to stress that the Government still attaches great importance to basic research. We are currently investigating how to further strengthen the advantage of our basic research in Hong Kong. Meanwhile, we are reviewing the InnoHK programme now and studying the possibility of a new round of application for InnoHK programme, including review of the exciting InnoHK centres next year, to continuously promote our international research collaboration.
 
     On the other hand, we will move full steam ahead with the construction of the Hong Kong‑Shenzhen Innovation and Technology Park in the Lok Ma Chau Loop and expedite the development of San Tin Technopole in the Northern Metropolis, which is going to provide more land and space to support the I&T industry development of Hong Kong. In collaboration with the newly established Office for Attracting Strategic Enterprises, we are fully committed and will proactively attract more high‑quality I&T enterprises and top-notch I&T talents to bring with them their businesses and R&D outcomes to Hong Kong. We will put a primary focus on those industries of strategic importance and advantages to Hong Kong, such as life and health technology, artificial intelligence and data science, and advanced manufacturing and new energy technology.
 
     Talent is one of the essential propellers for I&T development. We will endeavor to enlarge the I&T talent pool so as to create stronger impetus for the growth. By January 2023, we will relax the requirements under the Technology Talent Admission Scheme to facilitate I&T firms to bring in talents from outside Hong Kong, and we will increase the financial support to our R&D firms and organisations in engaging research talents under the Research Talent Hub Scheme in April 2023. At the same time, we will expand the STEM Internship Scheme to allow university STEM students studying in the overseas or the Greater Bay Area campuses established by the  local universities such as HKUST (Guangzhou) to take up internship offers in Hong Kong supported by the Government. 
 
     Government, industry, academic and research sectors are all playing a unique role in Hong Kong's I&T development. Through our joint efforts in the past, the I&T ecosystem in Hong Kong has become increasingly vibrant. To sustain this good momentum, cross-sector collaboration is the key. I am particularly pleased to see HKUST is not only leading in the aspect of technology research, but also dedicated to sharing knowledge and experiences with different sectors in the community, and building a strong connection with the industries.
 
     Today, we are lucky to have this invaluable opportunity to learn from the experiences of our industry leaders on the university-industry collaboration and to hear from a panel of distinguished HKUST's scholars about their insights on the latest I&T development in a range of industry areas. I hope you will all have some takeaways from today's event. In closing, I wish today's event every success and a fruitful experience for all of you.
 
     Thank you very much.
 
Ends/Monday, November 7, 2022
Issued at HKT 12:49
NNNN
Today's Press Releases