Quentin Parker

Opinion | How Hong Kong can play a critical role in the space economy

The ‘NewSpace’ industry, which includes the low Earth orbit vital to the global economy, is passing Hong Kong by when the city has such capacity to fund and manage it, incubate talent and tech, and help set up much-needed global regulations to deal with space debris

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Chinese astronaut decorations are seen outside Wong Tai Sin Temple in Hong Kong on September 6, 2022. Photo: Yik Yeung-man

Quentin Parker

Published: 8:00pm, 26 Feb 2024

Hong Kong needs to wake up to the opportunities of the “NewSpace” economy and the wealth-creating industries that are springing up around the commercial exploitation of the orbital environment.

Sadly, these industries are largely bypassing us (but not Macau) despite their huge potential for our city. This is especially as Hong Kong strives for greater technological relevance in the Greater Bay Area. It’s also because Hong Kong not only has the capacity, within our great universities and institutes, for talent incubation, innovation and technological breakthroughs, but also in the way the NewSpace economy can be funded, managed and supported.

This could be via our strong legal and compliance infrastructure, investment avenues, listing expertise and associated knowledge mechanisms, as befits a great global fintech hub. We just need the right “green light” environment set from on high. The investment interest is there.

I have been banging this drum for the last two years but I am not alone; there are now voices from key industry players and mainland operators, all marching to the same beat. Full disclosure – I have a clear interest in promoting and supporting the emergence of the NewSpace economy in Hong Kong, not for any meaningful pecuniary interest but for scientific and educational purposes.

The NewSpace economy covers the low Earth orbit a few hundred kilometres above us, where most of the world’s satellites are. It includes the geostationary realm, about 36,000km from us, where the satellites for global communications and TV are found.

By 2030, thanks to the companies like SpaceX, with their ever-increasing Starlink satellite constellations, there may be as many as 60,000 satellites. Their purposes include telecommunications, the internet, in-plane Wi-fi, remote sensing of our planet and pure science. Most, though, have an interest in monetising the ones and zeroes of the binary digital data transmitted back to Earth.

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