Digital Oasis

The start-up network is growing and diversifying quickly, extending from traditional hotspots like San Francisco and London to rising giants, such as Hong Kong, while developing economy centres across ASEAN are becoming super-nodes in their own right.

As a leading creative hub in Asia, Hong Kong is a natural design centre. And Mainland China, the factory of the world, is a natural outlet for Hong Kong’s design talents. China’s Anhui province, just inland of the Yangtze Delta, is eager to take on Hong Kong designs. The province is a rapidly growing smart manufacturing centre and Hefei is the site of the country’s first Advanced Technology Application and Promotion Centre.

Ageing populations are increasing the workload of in-demand medical professionals, especially in optometry.

A Hong Kong start-up, which introduced its cutting-edge extended reality (XE) technologies at FILMART earlier this year, will return in the next edition on 11-14 March 2024 to showcase innovative solutions and extend its presence in Mainland China to serve surging demand.

Eyewear that talks, briefs agents on top-secret missions, shoots laser beams and more has long been a staple of science fiction, but now smart glasses are moving off the silver screen and on to the high street.

India's rapid economic growth and youthful demographics have boosted industrial innovation and consumption. In 2021, India was Hong Kong's eighth-largest trading partner, the sixth largest economy in the world and ranked second in terms of population.