Shenzhen, HK aim for 'win-win' on technology

Shenzhen in Guangdong province and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region should focus on integrated development in technological cooperation, leveraging their complementary strengths to build a world-class innovation and technology ecosystem, experts and scholars said.

They made the remarks at the Guangming Science City Forum 2023, which kicked off in Shenzhen on Thursday.

"Integrated development is key for innovation and technology cooperation between Shenzhen and Hong Kong," said Nancy Ip Yuk-yu, president of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

The two cities have complementary advantages in the field, which lay a solid foundation for integrated development, with Hong Kong possessing strong scientific research capability and Shenzhen having a sound industry chain, she said in a keynote speech at the two-day event.

"By leveraging their respective strengths in integrated development, they can form a two-way and interconnected technological chain. And by integrating domestic and global I&T resources, they will be able to build a world-class I&T ecosystem," she said.

She hoped Shenzhen and Hong Kong could jointly build a cross-border innovation park, where universities do basic research, laboratories deal with research transformation, and incubation bases provide support for startups.

These, together with technological, legal and financial services, will form a whole I&T ecosystem, she said.

Fan Jianping, president of the Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said Shenzhen is a place where technology, capital and talent gather, and also a center for international exchanges.

"With the geographical proximity to Hong Kong, Shenzhen can connect quickly with the world and bring the best technology and talent there to develop industries," he said.

Nonetheless, sound development of an industry cannot be achieved with the strength of just one city, he pointed out. "Cooperation with other cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area is important. In particular, we need to give full play to the special roles of Hong Kong and Macao," Fan added.

Matthew Chang, the dean's chair and associate professor in biochemistry and synthetic biology at the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine at the National University of Singapore, pins high hopes on enhanced collaboration between Singapore and the Greater Bay Area in the field of synthetic biology, believing such work will create synergy and win-win results.

"Singapore has unique research expertise in synthetic biology which, in my view, can be very complementary to Shenzhen and the Greater Bay Area's research expertise. We should keep this discussion going. From the Singaporean side, we are more than ready to collaborate with Shenzhen and the Greater Bay Area in a more intimate manner," he said.