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and Re-industrialisation have been established to coordinate the blueprint for the development of the biotech industry, and
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Policy recommendations for the governments of Hong Kong and Shenzhen
various government bodies, the governance structure suffers from provide forward-looking scientific advice on areas such as clinical
a lack of a body designated for advising on long-term scientific research. Second to that is the optimisation of the government’s
development and from the absence of visionary scientists on the research funding mechanism and the consolidation of research
committees. As such, despite having identified biotech as one of funding that is scattered across various government bodies. It
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its four areas with a competitive edge, the government has not should on one hand devise a funding allocation strategy that
issued any blueprint for development. aligns with the blueprint for industrial development, and on the
other revise the allocation of universities’ research funding,
Looking abroad, both the US and Singapore have set up allowing institutions to collect overhead charges on a
designated scientific advisory bodies. The US Office of Science specified portion of the total funding for research projects.
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and Technology Policy provides the President and senior officials Thereby, encouraging universities to relax restrictions on
with analysis and assessment on the impact of science and researchers engaging in technology transfer and outside work and
technology on major policies and initiatives. In 2012, the White facilitating the effective commercialisation of advanced research
House unveiled the National Bioeconomy Blueprint, with the goal outcomes. Furthermore, as the peer review mechanism carries
of building a foundation for the US bioeconomy of the future. significant weighting in the evaluation of research projects, the
Similarly, Singapore has established a Science Advisory Board Office should encourage a more widespread adoption of the
with the mandate of identifying important areas of research and peer review mechanism in the government’s research projects.
international trends on basic research. Every five years, the
National Research Foundation of Singapore formulates national
strategies for the country’s scientific and technological research. Recommendation 2.2 Establishing
ancillary facilities for preclinical research
Hong Kong can follow in the footsteps of the US and Singapore
and establish a Hong Kong Science and Development Office In the biomedical R&D process, preclinical research is the stage
to advise the government on matters related to biotech (see that follows drug discovery. Broadly speaking, three types of
Figure 18). The primary objective of the Office is to formulate a laboratories are required for preclinical research: in-vitro (test tube
or cell culture), small animal, and large animal laboratories. In

54 Chaired by the Financial Secretary, the Committee on Innovation, Technology and Re-industrialisation is tasked with advising the government on fostering innovation in Hong Kong and
steering the direction of technological development.
55 Including biotech, AI, smart city and fintech.
56 Overhead charges for Hong Kong universities are generally low (about 15–30%). HKUST even levies no overhead charges on collaborative projects with NGOs. Globally, as other top
universities have generally higher overhead charges, universities are more willing to encourage researchers to engage in knowledge transfer. For example, although Harvard University has an
overhead charge of only 26% for research projects outside of campus, the charge for in-campus projects amounts to 69%, with Stanford University having a charge as high as 72% for
in-campus projects.
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