Forum fosters exchanges among PRD software industries
02 - 12 - 2004

More than 400 industry players and practitioners in the information technology (IT) field from Hong Kong and Guangdong Province attended the Pearl River Delta (PRD) Software Industry Forum (Autumn 2004) in Zhuhai today (December 2).

Jointly organised by the Commerce, Industry and Technology Bureau (CITB) of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government (HKSARG) and the Guangdong Information Industry Department (GIID) of the Central People's Government (CPG), the forum aimed to explore business and collaboration opportunities between Hong Kong and the Guangdong Province in software development.

With the inclusion of IT services as one of the trade liberalisation service areas, the second phase of the Mainland and Hong Kong Closer Economic Partnership Arrangement (CEPA) announced in August this year opened up new business and collaboration opportunities for the IT industries in Hong Kong and the Mainland.

Under the theme "New Opportunities for Co-operation in the software industry of Hong Kong and Guangdong under CEPA", government officials and industry players from the two places exchanged views on how co-operation between the two places in IT development, particularly in such areas as Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), software and IT services outsourcing, games software and Linux applications, could be strengthened.

Representing the HKSARG at the forum, the Government Chief Information Officer, Mr Alan Wong Chi-kong said that enhancing co-operation with the Mainland, PRD cities in particular, was a major agenda under the 2004 Digital 21 Strategy published in March this year.

"Hong Kong enterprises have international horizons, rich business knowledge and sound project management experience, while the Mainland has abundant human resources, technical strength and a large merchandise and service market," Mr Wong said.

"We believe that by engendering collaborative opportunities, the two places can jointly take up overseas IT projects and achieve mutual economic benefits."

The forum was well received by the participants. The panel sessions provided a good networking platform among industry players from Hong Kong and cities in Guangdong Province. Hong Kong enterprises showed keen interest in exploring further the possibility of forming partnership with their Mainland counterparts.

The PRD Software Industry Forum is held every six months, alternately by CITB of the HKSARG and GIID of the CPG. The first forum was held in Hong Kong in April this year.

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