
China's Silicon Valley Threatens to Swallow Up Hong Kong - tareqak
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2018-08-28/bridge-to-china-s-silicon-valley-may-swallow-up-hong-kong
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mccourt
This is a good article, but I wish it went a bit further into the complexities
facing Hong Kong as it seeks its place in a 21st century where access to
Chinese investments is no longer throttled by access to Hong Kong. I first
lived in Hong Kong as a student in 2006 and I remember thinking that the tech
push starting in Shenzhen would be dwarfed by tech growth in HK given its
already prominent status in the international community and density of top
notch universities.

When I visited in January, though, it felt like the opposite has happened;
Tencent has grown into an international behemoth and HK has failed to really
choose to invest in tech growth. I have friends at SUSTC, so I'm glad that
Shenzhen is making big things happen, but it is disappointing to see HK still
focused on running/growing the economy according to a 1980s playbook. Even the
cyberport really ended up feeling more like just a ploy to be able to build
more housing rather than an actual tech community.

Still time to make big things happen in HK, but, in my opinion, it's going to
take leaders in the business community to push for it and make investments. It
will also take strong collaboration with the outstanding academic community in
HK to make that happen.

I'd love to hear from people currently in HK about how then view the tech
sector and what their plans are.

