We are creating some awesome events for you. Kindly bear with us.

HK start-ups nurtured to help region become a tech hub

Image Credits: HKU, Press Release

The over 20 start-up founders and practitioners, together with alumni from a wide range of industries and business backgrounds, assembled in the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Forum on 10 October 2020, to discuss a heated topic for start-ups – venture capital financing and to respond to the HKU Business School’s call for establishing a start-up ecosystem.

Amidst the backdrop of the challenging local, regional and global economy, start-up founders are facing more difficulties to stand out from the crowd, meet the investors’ expectations and achieve success in venture capital financing. HKU Business School stepped up its efforts in nurturing a vibrant start-up ecosystem and launched the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Forum, aiming to share the best practice on how entrepreneurs and reputable investors worked together to turn an innovative idea into good business.

The Presidents of Hong Kong Venture Capital and Private Equity Association were invited to give out hints to the up-and-coming start-ups that may become the next unicorns.

The experts advised the founders to make sure they have stable, trustworthy teammates who would be able to share all the ups and downs and go through the cycle of growth and development. This could also benefit the firms’ fund-raising process as the investors will consider everything about their products, the team and the track-record of their companies. He cautioned the teams to not be afraid of failure, but to learn from it and keep their passion.

It was further illustrated that people-centred management becomes a very critical element when the aim is to want to become an effective entrepreneur. He advised the founders to continue evolving their business models over time, uphold the core of their businesses and leverage technology as an ancillary tool.

One of the event participants was inspired by the sharing from both of the speakers and found the Forum useful to transform her innovative idea into reality.  She noted that the speakers highlighted some potential concerns from large corporates when they consider investing in a business, which start-up founders may not be aware of before. For instance, how would the corporates evaluate the technology and the team structure of the start-ups?

The Dean of HKU Business School also encouraged all stakeholders in the ecosystem to work together during a time of stark economic challenge faced by Hong Kong recently. He stated that a comprehensive ecosystem is necessary for further assisting Hong Kong to transform to a heart of global innovation, technology and entrepreneurship hub. As part of the ecosystem, HKU Business School aims to continue to contribute to the local economy by nurturing innovative minds, promoting entrepreneurship spirits, building research facilities and reaching out to the society, China as well as the international community.

Propelling local start-ups

Hong Kong’s support of its start-ups is nothing new. HKU, in particular, has been a champion of homegrown innovation for a long time. For example, OpenGov Asia recently reported that, despite the pandemic, the University of Hong Kong (HKU), on 14 September 2020, signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with The Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute (ASTRI) to jointly cultivate future FinTech talents.

Under the agreement, HKU’s Department of Computer Science from the Engineering Faculty and ASTRI will together develop the Technology Oriented Practitioner (TOP) programme, a Work-Study Scheme for first-year students enrolled on the MSc programme in FinTech and Data Analytics at HKU, with ASTRI providing paid full-time employment for up to 30 students for a nine-month period and assigning them to one of ASTRI’s many ongoing FinTech projects, such as a smart credit assessment that helps SMEs secure loans or an AI-driven data analytics platform that empowers more effective risk management, keeping our society safer and smarter.

PARTNER

Qlik’s vision is a data-literate world, where everyone can use data and analytics to improve decision-making and solve their most challenging problems. A private company, Qlik offers real-time data integration and analytics solutions, powered by Qlik Cloud, to close the gaps between data, insights and action. By transforming data into Active Intelligence, businesses can drive better decisions, improve revenue and profitability, and optimize customer relationships. Qlik serves more than 38,000 active customers in over 100 countries.

PARTNER

CTC Global Singapore, a premier end-to-end IT solutions provider, is a fully owned subsidiary of ITOCHU Techno-Solutions Corporation (CTC) and ITOCHU Corporation.

Since 1972, CTC has established itself as one of the country’s top IT solutions providers. With 50 years of experience, headed by an experienced management team and staffed by over 200 qualified IT professionals, we support organizations with integrated IT solutions expertise in Autonomous IT, Cyber Security, Digital Transformation, Enterprise Cloud Infrastructure, Workplace Modernization and Professional Services.

Well-known for our strengths in system integration and consultation, CTC Global proves to be the preferred IT outsourcing destination for organizations all over Singapore today.

PARTNER

Planview has one mission: to build the future of connected work. Our solutions enable organizations to connect the business from ideas to impact, empowering companies to accelerate the achievement of what matters most. Planview’s full spectrum of Portfolio Management and Work Management solutions creates an organizational focus on the strategic outcomes that matter and empowers teams to deliver their best work, no matter how they work. The comprehensive Planview platform and enterprise success model enables customers to deliver innovative, competitive products, services, and customer experiences. Headquartered in Austin, Texas, with locations around the world, Planview has more than 1,300 employees supporting 4,500 customers and 2.6 million users worldwide. For more information, visit www.planview.com.

SUPPORTING ORGANISATION

SIRIM is a premier industrial research and technology organisation in Malaysia, wholly-owned by the Minister​ of Finance Incorporated. With over forty years of experience and expertise, SIRIM is mandated as the machinery for research and technology development, and the national champion of quality. SIRIM has always played a major role in the development of the country’s private sector. By tapping into our expertise and knowledge base, we focus on developing new technologies and improvements in the manufacturing, technology and services sectors. We nurture Small Medium Enterprises (SME) growth with solutions for technology penetration and upgrading, making it an ideal technology partner for SMEs.

PARTNER

HashiCorp provides infrastructure automation software for multi-cloud environments, enabling enterprises to unlock a common cloud operating model to provision, secure, connect, and run any application on any infrastructure. HashiCorp tools allow organizations to deliver applications faster by helping enterprises transition from manual processes and ITIL practices to self-service automation and DevOps practices. 

PARTNER

IBM is a leading global hybrid cloud and AI, and business services provider. We help clients in more than 175 countries capitalize on insights from their data, streamline business processes, reduce costs and gain the competitive edge in their industries. Nearly 3,000 government and corporate entities in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications and healthcare rely on IBM’s hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to affect their digital transformations quickly, efficiently and securely. IBM’s breakthrough innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and business services deliver open and flexible options to our clients. All of this is backed by IBM’s legendary commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity and service.

Send this to a friend