How can Hong Kong SAR Government assist innovation based companies and professionals in HK?

Legislation

1. Allocate more wireless spectrum for private and commercial use. This will encourage local and international technology companies to develop and market wireless technologies in Hong Kong. The only restriction should be the power level.

Law enforcement

2. Continue supporting Intellectual Property Department (IPD) and Customs to protect the interest of intellectual property holders.

3. Review patent invalidation proceedings in Hong Kong. Currently, patents can only be invalidated in High Court which is extremely costly and time consuming. In UK and China, the relevant patent laws provide routes of lower legal costs to invalidate patents through the respective Patent Offices. Consequently, the quality of Hong Kong patents can be improved, presently the local innovative industry being unduly threatened by ambiguous short-term patents that have never been examined on patentability.

Administration

4. Encourage government departments, companies and the public to build on others' innovations. If licensing fee is required for using others' innovations, IPD, Hong Kong Trade Development Council (TDC), Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC), and Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute (ASTRI) should assist by providing expert opinion and financial assistance. For licensing fee that is beyond the authoritative budget of the above organizations, Innovation Technology Commission (ITC) should provide necessary administrative and financial assistance.

5. Encourage HKPC, ASTRI, R&D centres and universities to innovate with the private sector. A company can license intellectual assets from these organizations for the most 0.5% of the intellectual asset development cost. If a company is willing to pay 20% of the development cost, the company can have exclusive right of the intellectual assets for 2 years. If there is more than one company willing to pay 20% of the development cost, the fee will be determined by an auction.

6. Establish Hong Kong as a trading hub for innovations based companies.

a. Further simplify working visa granting process for scientists, engineers, doctors and lawyers from overseas and mainland China.

b. Establish Hong Kong as an arbitration and mediation centre for regional innovation related disputes.

c. Further expand the testing, characterization and certification ability of Hong Kong Science and Technology Park (HKSTP), Hong Kong Cyberport Management Company (Cyberport) and HKPC.

d. Provide administrative and marketing support, through Investment Hong Kong, TDC and ITC, to attract international standard organizations to establish offices and certification centres in Hong Kong.

7. Assist companies to establish legal rights on their innovations.

a. Establish a voluntary copyright registration electronic submission system. The system should be free of charge. This could foster development in trading of copyright based innovations and reduce ownership uncertainty.

b. Provide financial assistance for design registration. Appoint HKPC to administrate financial assistance and provide technical expertise to companies. HKPC will fund the legal cost and drafting cost for one design registration per company per year.

c. Provide financial assistance for patent application. Appoint HKPC to administrate financial assistance and provide technical expertise to companies. HKPC will fund the legal cost and drafting cost for one local patent per company per year.

8. Lower patent application cost.

a. As there are not enough patent professionals and no patent examination system in Hong Kong, Hong Kong companies have to go overseas in order to establish their patent rights. Comparing to Singapore and Shanghai, this dramatically increases patent application cost in Hong Kong by 50% to 100%. Hong Kong should follow Singapore's patent practice. This can be achieved by (1) establishing a patent examination office in Hong Kong, (2) encouraging more qualified Hong Kong residents to work as patent professionals, and (3) attracting foreign qualified patent agents to work in Hong Kong.

b. As a transition stage to establish a professional team in IPD specializing on patentability examination, reference can be made to Macau's patent practice, in which patent searching is carried out by PRC State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO). The local patent registrar (i.e.: IPD) shall consider the search report and written opinion issued by SIPO and make its own decision in granting a relevant Hong Kong patent . Under the current Hong Kong patent system, a short-term patent is granted irrespective of the patent search results, hence causing ambiguities in presuming the validity of a "granted patent". Eventually, it makes local innovative companies very difficult to exploit their patent rights, e.g.: suing infringers, licensing the patented technologies.

c. When the number of patent professionals increases in Hong Kong and there is no need to go overseas for patent application, the cost of patent application will decrease. However, in order to supervise the quality of patent professionals in Hong Kong, the government should (1) establish a patent agent qualification system in Hong Kong and (2) provide subsidized training program for the patent agent qualification exam.

9. Enlarge the scope of SERAP program to seed stage. Conditional funding should be given to technology professionals who have not quitted their full-time job. Funding should then be provided once the technology professionals start working full-time in the start-ups.

Education

10. Encourage universities to use innovation licensing revenue as one of performance indicators for university professors.

11. Encourage the public and companies to write more songs and make more movies, by giving HK residents and companies free license for RTHK audio and video archives.

12. Educate the public the limitation of Hong Kong short-term patent and China utility patent. This could eliminate a lot of unnecessary disputes and increase the public awareness on the importance of invention patent.

13. Create internship/secondment programs in university research labs, HKPC, ASTRI, Cyberport and R&D Centres that companies can send their technology professionals to these organizations for training. During the secondment period, the technology professionals will be paid by these organizations to conduct R&D activities on projects assigned by these organizations.