HK Talents Eye Greener Pastures in Bay Area
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8 HK | BUSINESS Friday, June 22, 2018 CHINA DAILY HONG KONG EDITION HK talents eye greener pastures in Bay Area Guangdong cities prime the pump as One major SAR startups head north for a future goal of the plan (the Greater By CHAI HUA in Shenzhen Now, they’ve managed to get Bay Area) is to allow [email protected] hold of a plot of land about 20 times bigger than that Lo had at Hong Kong and With the the university and on which he blueprint has hinged his career. Macao to be bet- for the high- Lo aspires to be a farmer with ter integrated with profi led a di erence — using technol- Guangdong- ogy and planting by computer. Guangdong’s indus- Hong Kong- To be specific, the trio eyes Macao building the largest and most trial chains.” Greater Bay advanced aquaponics produc- Wang Fuqiang, director of the Area set in motion, member tion base in China. department of industrial planning cities of the Pearl River Delta Aquaponics — a novel and at the China Center for Interna- (PRD) cluster have emerged green farming technique their tional Economic Exchanges as potential fertile grounds for startup is developing — refers Hong Kong entrepreneurs from to the combination of aquacul- tural di erences. But, with the a wide spectrum of the city’s ture (raising fi sh) and hydro- national planning of the Bay budding industries. ponics (the soilless growing of Area in top gear, an improve- Victor Lo, Fung Leung and plants). The environmentally- ment in the situation may well Mandy Tam are all young entre- friendly and sustainable pro- be on the horizon. preneurs born in the 1990s. duction method could realize Wang Fuqiang, director of They grew up in metropolitan a natural ecosystem and boost the department of industrial Hong Kong, but have opted for traditional farming e ciency. planning at the China Center one of the most unlikely careers The mainland, naturally, looks The Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, comprising nine cities in Guangdong province and the two SARs, has been an for International Economic in such a monstrous concrete the logical choice as far as loca- enduring growth pole for luring talents and Hong Kong entrepreneurs to conduct business there. JUSTIN CHIN / BLOOMBERG Exchanges, who took part in jungle — farming. tion is concerned for such a big planning the Bay Area, said It all came about when Lo farming enterprise. “After fail- a three-hour drive from Hong upgrading technology and exchange activities, to polish GDP growth rate still hovered one major goal of the plan is to was still an undergrad at the ing to fi nd a right place in Hong Kong. Jiangmen is among the management methods so that up its name for entrepreneurs around 7 to 8 percent last year. allow Hong Kong and Macao greenery encroached Chinese Kong, we decided to try our luck nine-city cluster in Guangdong more people can a ord green from both Hong Kong and More importantly, they offer to be better integrated with University of Hong Kong, on the mainland with its vast province that, along with the food,” said Lo. He hopes Hong Macao who are still relatively land and resource assets that Guangdong’s industrial chains. attending to a 20-square-meter land resources,” said Tam. special administrative regions Kong people could be the fi rst unfamiliar with the inner land are instrumental for various “To achieve that goal, we vegetable garden right in front In 2016, the trio visited an of Hong Kong and Macao, to taste the vegetables that are city that has trailed well behind industries, attracting many need to solve the problem of of his dormitory — a project agriculture innovation cen- make up the Bay Area geared “grown by Hong Kong youths” other Guangdong cities, nota- Hong Kong investors. hardware and software inter- he and his two partners have ter in Jiangmen, a city on the to rivaling the bay areas of New on the mainland. bly Guangzhou, Shenzhen and As early as 2012, Hong Kong connection,” he said in an inter- never given up. west bank of the PRD and just York, San Francisco and Tokyo Their story has been an inspi- Zhuhai, in terms of investment, Science and Technology Parks view with Guangzhou Daily. when in full swing. ration for many Hong Kong infrastructure development or Corporation had set up an Upcoming mega infrastruc- The Jiangmen plant, which youths. Students from the Hong social amenities. Guangzhou, incubator jointly with the local ture projects, such as the Hong happens to be working on soil- Kong University of Science and Shenzhen and Zhuhai have government of Foshan, a small Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge less planting and seeking more Technology, Heung To Middle attracted scores of Hong Kong manufacturing center. Foshan is and the Guangzhou-Shenzhen- modern farming projects, pro- School and several other educa- startups on the strength of pref- currently building “Hong Kong Hong Kong Express Rail Link, vided the Hong Kong startup tional institutions have visited erential policies in their free and Macao towns” to lure more which are slated to open later a land parcel of 400 square their project. trade zones — Nansha, Qian- startups from the two SARs, this year, will pay an instrumen- meters for free and an initial Moreover, 15 startups from hai and Hengqin — which have with a 200-million-yuan fund tal part in facilitating people-to- fund of 50,000 yuan ($7693.75). Hong Kong and Macao had played a key motivating role. planned to be plowed into Hong people exchanges, and the Bay The center also has a fully decided or were planning to Although other cities in Kong projects in three years. Area could further strengthen equipped laboratory where Lo move to Jiangmen to further Guangdong’s Bay Area cluster Compared with Guang- logistics and fi nancial links and and his team could conduct incubate by late last year, — Foshan, Zhongshan, Dong- dong’s free trade zones, hurdles bring about taxation reform and The impending opening of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge will all kinds of tests. “Our goal is according to local government guan, Zhaoqing and Huizhou to starting a business in these equal treatment for Hong Kong further strengthen exchanges in the Bay Area and boost the region’s to bring down the cost of pro- officials. Jiangmen has gone — are also not as developed as cities remain, such as dispa- and Macao residents living and economic growth. D.J. CLARK / CHINA DAILY ducing organic vegetables by to great lengths, with years of Guangzhou or Shenzhen, their rate taxation systems and cul- working in the Bay Area. The patent dispute between Coolpad and Xiaomi just sheds IP rights in focus as giants fi ght it out some light on the lengthy and rough By LUO WEITENG in Hong Kong last month. den LeEco, which sold o 18 ging smartphone manufac- battle, which should be the last road that patent owners have to take to in Hong Kong The plainti accuses Xiaomi percent of its 29-percent stake turer, said earlier the company thing that Coolpad wants to see,” [email protected] of having infringed on four of in Coolpad in January, the com- has more than 10,000 mobile said Qu Sanqiang, professor and protect their rights.” its patents, including patented pany suspended trading in its business-related patents, many dean of the Law School at the Qu Sanqiang, professor and dean of the Law School at the Beijing The story of “if you can’t beat multi-simcard design and other shares in March last year when of which are being infringed on Beijing Institute of Technology. Institute of Technology them, sue them” has moved to technologies relating to user it delayed revealing a loss of by other smartphone brands. It By fi ling a request to declare China. interface. Two patents, claimed HK$4.38 billion for the 2016 just does not have enough mon- Coolpad’s patents invalid, Xiao- into the money-losing company. By the end of March this year, Chinese mainland smart- to be “ahead of its time”, were year due to audit problems. ey to take further legal action, at mi essentially kicks the can Riding high on the under- Xiaomi had more than 7,000 phone maker Coolpad has granted in 2006 two years The Shenzhen-based enter- least for the time being. down the road to the SIPO’s takings to clamp down on IP patents to its name and 49 per- taken technology behemoth before the Android system was prise was unable to report its Coolpad has placed its hopes Patent Reexamination Board, infringement, economic com- cent of them are trademarked Xiaomi to court over alleged released. One patent, in par- 2017 annual financial results on a $300-million funding in which has the fi nal say in the pensation for patent litigation outside the Chinese mainland. patent infringement in a sign ticular, had been awarded the on time as losses from its January to help take it back to request for patent reexamina- on the mainland, though vary- The company also had over of its determination to time the Chinese Outstanding Patented struggling business continue a growth trajectory. The new tion and invalidation, said Qu, ing from case to case, has been 16,000 pending applications, litigation with a nation-wide Invention & Industrial Design to pile up and sees no sign of investment is led by Chinese who is also executive vice-pres- on a tear today, said Li Yang, according to its prospectus.