Hong Kong to set up first national innovation centre outside mainland China

Hong Kong's Financial Secretary Paul Chan announced a major strategic pivot in the city's 2026-27 budget, positioning it as a key player in China's national tech ambitions. The centerpiece is the establishment of the first national manufacturing innovation centre located outside mainland China, coupled with a new high-level steering committee dedicated to accelerating artificial intelligence development. This move is a direct alignment with China's 15th five-year plan (2026-2030), aiming to integrate Hong Kong into the country's broader development strategy while consolidating its role as an international innovation hub. The government also unveiled a comprehensive AI literacy drive, earmarking funds for various organizations to establish public courses on the technology.

A critical technical component of this initiative is the formation of the Hong Kong RISC-V Alliance, led by the government's investment arm, the Hong Kong Investment Corporation. This alliance will focus on facilitating investment and development in RISC-V, an open-source chip architecture that serves as an alternative to proprietary designs from companies like Arm and Intel. By fostering cross-industry cooperation within the Greater Bay Area and pursuing international collaboration, Hong Kong aims to build sovereign capability in a foundational technology. This represents a significant step in the global semiconductor landscape, promoting an open-source hardware ecosystem that could reduce dependency on Western-controlled architectures and spur local innovation in CPUs for everything from smartphones to data centers.