PolyU signs MoU with three strategic partners in support of “GBA PolyVentures 2025”

Professor Wing-tak Wong, Deputy President and Provost of PolyU (front), and Mr Richie Chen, CEO and Founder of Hai Robotics Co, Ltd (left on the screen), signed the “GBA PolyVentures 2025” Strategic Partnership MoU, witnessed by (starting from left at the back) Mr Richard Leung, PolyU Council Member, Dr Lawrence Li Kwok-chang, PolyU’s Deputy Council Chairman, Mr Alfred Sit, Secretary for Innovation and Technology of the HKSAR Government, Professor Jin-Guang Teng, PolyU President, Dr Miranda Lou, Executive Vice President of PolyU, and Mr Bing Fang, COO and Co-founder of Hai Robotics Co, Ltd (right on the screen).

Dr Miranda Lou, Executive Vice President of PolyU (front), and Mr Wang Yizhe, Managing Director of China Everbright Ltd (second from left on the screen), signed the “GBA PolyVentures 2025” Strategic Partnership MoU, witnessed by (starting from left at the back) Mr Richard Leung, PolyU Council Member, Dr Lawrence Li Kwok-chang, PolyU’s Deputy Council Chairman, Mr Alfred Sit, Secretary for Innovation and Technology of the HKSAR Government, Professor Jin-Guang Teng, PolyU President, Professor Wing-tak Wong, Deputy President and Provost of PolyU, Mr So Hiu Pang, Vice President of China Everbright Ltd (first from right on the screen) and Ms Fan Wenhan, Investment Director of China Everbright Ltd (first from left on the screen).

Dr Miranda Lou, Executive Vice President of PolyU (front left), and Mr Hendrick Sin, Chairman of StartupHK Fund Ltd (front right), signed the “GBA PolyVentures 2025” Strategic Partnership MoU, witnessed by (starting from left at the back) Professor Wing-tak Wong, Deputy President and Provost of PolyU, Mr Richard Leung, PolyU Council Member, Dr Lawrence Li Kwok-chang, PolyU’s Deputy Council Chairman, Mr Alfred Sit, Secretary for Innovation and Technology of the HKSAR Government, Professor Jin-Guang Teng, PolyU President, and Dr Winnie Tang, Honorary Chairman of StartupHK Fund Ltd.

PolyU signed memoranda of understanding (MoU) last month with three strategic partners to further propel the “GBA PolyVentures 2025” blueprint laid down by the University to leverage PolyU’s experience in innovation and entrepreneurship education to provide the necessary support for nurturing deep tech ventures and accelerating their growth.

The collaboration also aims to translate research excellence into societal impact to contribute to the development of innovation and technology in the Greater Bay Area (GBA). The MoU were signed between PolyU and its strategic partners, namely Everbright Limited, StartupHK Fund and Hai Robotics.

Hai Robotics, one of the strategic partners, was nurtured under PolyU’s entrepreneurship ecosystem and has recently become a unicorn. Hai Robotics is a start-up that provides autonomous case-handling robotic systems. It was founded in 2016 by 2012 graduate Mr Richie Chen and 2014 graduate Mr Bing Fang of PolyU’s Department of Electronic and Information Engineering. The start-up witnessed rapid growth by making use of the manufacturing advantages of the GBA and benefitting from the enormous opportunities of the Mainland China market.

In order to further promote the development of research and entrepreneurship in the GBA and to nurture future research talents to address market needs, PolyU continues to collaborate closely with industry partners through “GBA PolyVentures 2025”, providing comprehensive support for start-ups in different stages from education and incubation, to accelerating and strengthening their development. The goal is to distil more than 300 seed stage innovation start-ups into at least 20 deep tech ventures each year and to nurture 25 impactful scale-ups in the GBA in the next few years through collaboration with strategic partners and various supporting initiatives such as PolyU’s new “Entrepreneurship Investment Fund”.

According to the MoU, PolyU and Hai Robotics will explore establishing a joint innovation centre to promote PolyU’s education in innovation and entrepreneurship, nurture talents in “New Engineering”, and conduct applied research in robotics-related topics. PolyU and Everbright Limited will invest resources to help start-ups develop through collaboration between technology and industry, provide support to promising research projects, and roll out an internship programme for nurturing innovation talents. PolyU and StartupHK Fund will co-invest in PolyU’s start-ups and help them enter the GBA market as well as launch initiatives to strengthen entrepreneurship education.