116 Commerce and Industry
Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute Company Limited
The publicly-funded Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute Company Limited (ASTRI) was set up in January 2000 for carrying out R&D projects to raise the standard of Hong Kong's technology-based industries and to strengthen their growth. The ASTRI houses the R&D Centre for Information and Communications Technologies which focuses. five technology sectors: communications technologies, consumer electronics, integrated circuit design, opto-electronics, and bio-medical electronics.
Research and Development Centres
The Government has set up five R&D Centres to drive and co-ordinate applied R&D in selected focus areas and to promote commercialisation of R&D results and technology transfer. The five centres are:
• Automotive Parts and Accessory Systems R&D Centre;
• R&D Centre for Information and Communications Technologies under ASTRI;
• Hong Kong Research Institute of Textiles and Apparel;
Hong Kong R&D Centre for Logistics and Supply Chain Management Enabling Technologies; and
• Nano and Advanced Materials Institute.
Technology Co-operation with the Mainland
The Mainland/Hong Kong Science and Technology Co-operation Committee was formed in 2004. It is a high-level steering committee for the Mainland's Ministry of Science and Technology and Hong Kong's Commerce and Economic Development Bureau to work together in fostering technology collaboration.
The committee held its sixth meeting in August 2011. The two sides agreed to reinforce collaboration under the National 12th Five-Year Plan, which include following up on the initiatives for setting up a 'National High-tech Industrialisation Base' and a 'Chinese National Engineering Research Centre' in Hong Kong. With regard to the former, the Ministry of Science and Technology approved the Hong Kong Science Park as the National High-tech Industrialisation Base (Partner Base) for Green Technology in November 2011.
To support the 'Partner State Key Laboratories' in Hong Kong to strengthen their research capability, the ITF will provide funding support up to $10 million to each Partner State Key Laboratory during the period 2011-12 to 2015-16.
The HKSAR and Guangdong governments run jointly a Guangdong-Hong Kong Technology Co-operation Funding Scheme (TCFS) to encourage collaboration between their universities, research institutions and technology enterprises. Since its inception in 2004, the TCFS has supported more than 30 projects costing over $200 million. The 8th meeting of the Guangdong/Hong Kong Expert Group on Co-operation in Innovation and Technology was held in Guangzhou. The meeting agreed to further enhance science and technology collaboration between Hong