School News

“Creativity, Innovation and Entrepreneurship in China (CIEC)” Summer Virtual Programme was successfully completed on 20 June, 2023.

Launched in 2019, the CIEC programme aims to provide the younger generation with an in-depth understanding of the economic development in Hong Kong and Mainland China, as well as the latest trend in business, economics, creativity, innovation and entrepreneurship in the Greater Bay Area.  In 2023, we are delighted to have brought together 52 students from different faculties at The University of Hong Kong and other top universities in Canada, Taiwan, United Kingdom and mainland China. Students from China, India, Indonesia, Netherlands, South Korea, Taiwan and U.S.A had actively participated in the CIEC regardless of their geographic location. The programme, taking an innovative pedagogical approach itself, was led by CIEC Programme Directors, Mr. Joseph Chan and Dr. Jing Li.

This year, we collaborated with 15 companies from all walks of life, including aerospace, biotechnology, AI, big data, telecommunications, sustainability, medical, food & beverage, finance, fintech, property development, public administration, retail and other innovative technology to offer students the opportunities to learn and gain insights into various industries from our guest speakers, who are either senior management or founders of the corporates. The programme also provided students with ample opportunities to discuss and present their innovative ideas on hot topics in technology applications, cultural innovation and digital transformation.

CIEC Programme Directors, Mr. Chan and Dr. Li, had conducted interviews with guest speakers from these companies before the programme began. After broadcasting the interview videos, students got the chance to interact with the industry experts in the Q&A sessions throughout the 9-day programme. These interactive sessions offered valuable opportunities for students, not only to understand the real business landscape and environment, development and policy of different industries but also to explore their own future development and planning. 15 speakers for the guest lectures included (in alphabetical order of industry partners):

• Kent Shi, Founder, Carbon Zero New Energy
• Felix Ren, General Manager, Eccom Network (HK)
• Jason Ho, FTICA HK CEO & Broad Member, FTI Consulting
• Yee Tsang, General Manager, Grand Field Group
• Scarlett Liu, Founder & CEO, Han Empire Group
• Hayman Chan, Founder, HaymanChan
• Michael Hu, Technology Strategy Director, Hong Kong Aerospace Technology Group
• Jenny Yeung, Director/ Operation Director, Jointek Business
• William Shum, Founder & CEO, Memorigin Watch
• Linda Cheng, Operation Director, My Heart Bodibra
• Daniel Wang, Chief Investment Officer, Peakvest Group
• Luyi Mo, Vice President, Pony.AI
• Steven Pun, Founder & CEO, Protech Electronics & Technology
• Edward Yu, Head of District office, Yau Tsim Mong District
• Xiangrong Dai, Executive Director, Zhaoke Ophthalmology

Participants also had the opportunity to explore different cultural spots in Hong Kong through Storius, a self-guided app that promote culture with advanced technology. Co-founder and CEO of Storius, Mr. Freddy Law, also shared personal story and career path, which gave a lot of advice to the students on career planning. After experiencing the app, students were engaged to discuss and share their views on the business model towards Storius’ target market and presented their business and digital innovation ideas directly to the related department heads.

Mr. Chan gave the greatest appreciation to our guests who took time out of their busy schedule for interactive conversation and answered our students’ questions from their heart. Mr. Chan commended CIEC is a programme to showcase the industries’ insight on innovation and entrepreneurship  in GBA, plus the valuable sharing of our guests’ own real life experience and entrepreneurship journey.  He also shared that at HKU Business School, we are building this multimedia database of business cases, which aims at establishing the knowledge hub for the local and global innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem.

Dr. Li added that active participation of all students made the whole programme full of interesting and exciting moments, which is the most valuable part of CIEC programme. Student insights and responses were definitely very impressive. She looks forward to having some firm visits with the students in the programme in the future.