Get Subsidized for Trying New Tech
If 2021 is the year of the Industrial Revolution, fintech would be electricity. As the boisterous advancement in technology quietly reshapes the way we work, live and communicate, change is not only inevitable, it is encouraged. To further the integration of fintech in finance, The Financial Service & the Treasury Bureau of The HKSAR Government announced the Fintech Proof-of-Concept (POC) Subsidy Scheme, with Cyberport as the administrator.
Hong Kong and Fintech, and its Implications
Hong Kong is an international financial hub packed with multinational financial institutions. To support the growing demands in service quantity and quality, grooming fintech businesses started building upon this sturdy foundation in the mid-2010s, and now over 600 fintech startups reside in this city alone. Traditional institutions are gradually realizing the significance of collaboration with fintech in order to outrun their competitors.
The Subsidy’s Objectives
The PoC subsidy aims to foster collaboration between traditional financial institutions and the matured fintech solutions to drive change and push these companies to a new era of unstoppable growth. It puts ideas into reality by subsidizing proof-of-concept fintech projects. The Government is essentially paying financial institutions to try new technology that may potentially boost their business.
Subsidy Amount
Approved projects would receive a one-off grant, with the amount determined by its breadth and complexity. Projects may receive up to HKD100k. Cross-border/boundary projects (eg. Greater Bay Area, ASEAN) may even receive up to HKD150k.
Who could apply?
An application should be submitted jointly by a
1. Financial institution regulated by the Monetary Authority, the Securities and Futures Commission, the Insurance Authority and/or the Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority, and
2. A Hong Kong registered company which has a fixed physical office in Hong Kong, with its main businesses in the Fintech fields (including but not limited to those) listed below:
a. Asset Management
b. Bank Operations
c. Blockchain
d. Data and Analytics
e. Deposit and Lending
f. Financial Management
g. Financial Software
h. Insurance
i. Payments and Clearing
j. Platforms
k. Regtech
SuperAcc, would be a well-fitted example for this subsidy. They are a Hong Kong registered company with an office in the Innocenter, and its financial statement robot leverages NLP and deep learning to revolutionize how financial institutions deal with financial and banking transactions, as well as customer onboarding.
Project Nature
The integration of fintech into financial operations is not novel, and many have already proven to bring impressive and prospective effects. Given the definition of proof-of-concept - evidence demonstrating feasibility and efficacy, derived from a pilot project, the PoC subsidy will only support projects with no prior use-case in the market, aiming to procure verification for the fresh technology. By pioneering in such collaborations, financial institutions gain the technological edge against their competitors.
Next Steps
Application period: 26th February, 2021 - 30th June, 2021
1. Reach out to/be open to outreaches from prospective fintech vendors/startups
Hong Kong, as a top fintech hub, hosts a variety of solutions. It doesn’t take much effort to tap into this robustly expanding network.
2. Through discussion, identify processes that can potentially be improved by fintech
With the experienced data scientists and technical expertise, there is bound to be room for collaboration between financial institutions and fintech solution providers.
This networking should not bear the sole intention of joining the subsidy scheme, rather to maintain an open mind to seek technological improvements for your company.
3. Discuss Details and Apply!
Cyberport will publish details such as application procedures, supporting documents required, etc, on this website in due course.
We can expect to need the following information for the application
