Update on December 9: Application details for Hong Kong entrepreneurs to apply for the "Empowering Young Entrepreneurs (EYE) program are now available here. Application deadline is January 20, 2014.
Hong Kong has long been known for international trade and finance — but not e-commerce.
In the past 15 years, the Internet has rewired Hong Kong’s giants in trade and finance, allowing them to streamline and grow their operations around the world. The Internet is now as important to
Hong Kong’s trading companies as its shipping lanes. The rest of the economy hasn’t moved as quickly on top of the Internet. One reason could be how discouraging it can be for young people to try out new business models on Hong Kong’s amazing Internet infrastructure. They struggle to find office space or venture financing that their peers in other countries have readier access to. Meanwhile, a tempting perch at a Hong Kong trading desk beckons many of the city’s brightest minds.
To help build an environment that supports young entrepreneurs, we’ve partnered with the
Entrepreneurship Center in the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) on a one-year program that will focus on empowering and enabling young entrepreneurs here.
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| Eric Schmidt speaking with students and entrepreneurs at the announcement of the partnership at the Chinese University of Hong Kong |
It will include:
- An incubation and mentorship program, designed with CUHK, for student and young entrepreneur participants;
- A sponsored trip for outstanding program participants to Google headquarters in Silicon Valley to meet and connect with experts in the global community; and
- Efforts to help these young entrepreneurs overcome the startup costs and isolation that come with high rents and a fragmented entrepreneurship community.
We will be announcing program details in the coming weeks.
Hong Kong is one of those places that thrills if you care about the Internet. It has cheap, ultrafast and ubiquitous broadband that’s among the best in the world. The government has allowed information to flow freely, which has allowed businesses to flourish online. We hope this new program will help to foster Hong Kong’s digital economy by turning more young people from Internet consumers to Internet innovators.
Posted by Scott Beaumont, Managing Director, Google Greater China
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