How Hong Kong can become a centre for East-West data exchange

With the digital economy now about 15.5 per cent of global GDP, countries are restricting cross-border data flows in a bid for data supremacy

To deploy its long-standing strength as the intermediary between China and the world, Hong Kong must excel at handling, storing and processing data

3-MIN READ3-MIN

A woman looks at a screen in China Telecom Cloud Computing’s information park in the Guian new area in southwest China’s Guizhou province in April 2020. Photo: Xinhua

Allen YeungandAdam Au

Published: 4:30pm, 19 May 2022

“No innovation, no future.” During his journey to becoming Hong Kong’s chief executive-elect, John Lee Ka-chiu has minced no words in highlighting innovation’s role in shaping our future. Central to his proposed policies is the ambition to develop Hong Kong into a technology centre to enhance the city’s competitive advantage.

Lee delivered his message as Hong Kong was recovering from the worst wave of the Covid-19 pandemic to date. Nevertheless, it resonated with the call for broader government endorsement of digital transformation.

Digitalisation has become a force to be reckoned with, to say nothing of its spillover effect of uplifting traditional industries. Data is the fuel that powers digitalisation.

According to World Bank data, the digital economy is about 15.5 per cent of global gross domestic product and has grown 2.5 times faster than overall GDP in the past 15 years. The availability of data has resulted in tectonic shifts in the business landscape. How to turn such resources into exploitable insights separates the wheat from the chaff.