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Silicon Valley? London? Or maybe Hong Kong? Which one of those places deserves the crown of the world’s entrepreneurship hub?
This week many countries around our little planet earth have been “celebrating” global entrepreneurship week. Big metropolitan cities around the world try to compete with each other to become the place to go for innovative startups, often luring talented individuals and teams with modern facilities, mentoring and funding to commercialise brilliant projects.
If entrepreneurship is your thing, then keep reading. In this article I will share with you what opportunities Hong Kong offers should you decide to study here. There are three key areas where you can look for support to work on your unicorn in Hong Kong.
Cyberport is described as the home to one incubation facility for ICT (Information and Communications Technology) startups called Entrepreneurship Centre providing office space, financial aid package, training, micro fund and network access to the investment community.
Thanks to Hong Kong Baptist University (where I study the MSc Business Management) I had a chance to visit this incredible place and learn more about the support they offer, and I left certainly not disappointed. The most important aspect for any start up is funding! Cyberport is very generous when it come to that matter. They have three layers of support ranging from 100K HKD microfund to equity investment of up to 20M HKD. They frequently run competitions where students can pitch their ideas and potentially win not only money but mentorship programmes with trips to the US or China to enhance their business skills.
When it comes to entrepreneurship networking is the key. And I have learnt it first hand. During a networking dinner organised by HKBU Business School I met one of the alumnis who was shortlisted for the Cyberport finals. Since we both shared a common interest in entrepreneurship he invited me to come! Thus I had a chance to watch one of those pitching competitions live as it was happening. It was invaluable experience to learn more about the competition, learn from others pitches and see it for yourself before you apply! He won, and full credit to him because he has worked very hard on his project!
Another similar place to Cyberport is Hong Kong Science Park, which describe itself as a living laboratory where innovative technologies are tested and applied, and valuable data and feedback are collected to enable future innovation. It is also piloted as a smart region to further Hong Kong’s Smart City vision. Although so far I have not visited this place personally, I am aware of various initiatives that they are offering. Hong Kong Science Park offers incubation programmes to help start-ups turn their innovative ideas into marketable products and solutions. Their key areas are split into three: Incu-App, Incu-Tech, and Incu-Bio in the fields of web and mobile technology, technology and biotechnology respectively.
Finally there is cross Universities Support offered to students in Hong Kong. No matter what university you end up in, chances are there are various entrepreneurship competitions running there. What really surprised me about Hong Kong is that universities actually cooperate with each other in what I called Knowledge Transfer, collaborating and sharing opportunities to different students from all universities in Hong Kong.
One of the competitions I signed-up to participate in is called Hong Kong Techathon. At the heart of this idea is mingle and build cross-university teams.
The more diverse teams will have a chance to secure more funding, as every university pledges to contribute a certain amount of support to winning teams providing that the team has a student from that university. This year’s host university — PolyU organised multiple mixers where students from different universities can get to know each other, network and join different teams. I managed to find 3 talented tech students who will be joining my team for the competition next week!
Exactly a year ago I was in London, writing an article about Global Entrepreneurship Week. At the time I was participating in Barnet Entrepreneurial Competition in London where I managed to get into the finals. Today I found myself in this incredible place where I have even more support and focus on entrepreneurship. I strongly suggest you to consider Hong Kong if you are thinking of doing a masters and you are into start ups.
