PolyU welcomes the initiatives in the Financial Secretary’s 2021-22 Budget

Professor Jin-Guang TENG, President of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU), welcomes and supports the initiatives on innovation and technology (I&T) as well as higher education as announced in the Financial Secretary's 2021-22 Budget. He said the Government’s decision of allocating resources to education, social welfare and healthcare, despite the adverse local and global economic situation, will improve people’s livelihoods and contribute to the future development of society.

PolyU is grateful to the Government for its funding support to enhance the University’s development in health sciences and health technology studies to cater to the needs of the community. Almost a thousand students graduate from PolyU’s healthcare programmes each year, and the Government’s funding will be utilised to carry out renovation and facility enhancement works to further its development of healthcare teaching. Furthermore, the construction of the academic building on the Ho Man Tin Slope has commenced and is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2026. The new building will provide over 10,000 m² floor area, which will facilitate the increase of student places at the Department of Rehabilitation Sciences and School of Optometry.

The University has submitted proposals with world-leading institutions under the AIR@InnoHK and Health@InnoHK research clusters to support the Government’s InnoHK initiative. With the launch of the “InnoHK Research Clusters”, PolyU will establish several laboratories specifically for the development of health technology, artificial intelligence and robotics. The University will also continue to proactively recruit top talent from around the globe and will leverage its world-class research infrastructure to transfer research output into practical solutions for industry through collaborating with both academic and business partners.

In view of the Government’s investment in the “Technology Start-up Support Scheme for Universities” in the past three years, PolyU is of the view that the scheme has helped foster innovation and technology development at the University and promoted an entrepreneurial spirit. Over the past ten years, PolyU has supported more than 300 start-ups and some of them have been successfully commercialised. The University has also introduced the “GBA Start-up Internship and Immersion Programme” and the “GBA Start-up Postdoc Programme” through engaging academic and industry mentors to support PolyU students in the development of I&T and start-ups.

The Global STEM Professorship Scheme will help encourage overseas talent to come and work in Hong Kong, thus adding new momentum to the city's I&T development. PolyU believes that the rapid development of technology globally is making huge strides in the domain of emerging technologies, such as life science, materials science, data science, artificial intelligence, and robotics. PolyU will continue to strive for excellence in the research of these areas, and hire top-notch scholars with different expertise to support the sustainable development of teaching, learning, and innovative research in future.

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