Building Hong Kong's AI future.
Hong Kong’s economy is built around high-value services and global connections. Services account for more than 90% of GDP, with financing and insurance alone contributing over a fifth. That gives Hong Kong a strong foundation for AI, because many of the technology’s largest productivity gains are concentrated in knowledge-intensive work.
Used well, AI can strengthen this services core while amplifying the flows that define Hong Kong: businesses selling overseas, visitors coming in, and ideas and creative work travelling across borders. It can help smaller businesses reach new customers, accelerate scientific discovery and give people more time for what matters.
Today, we’re publishing a factsheet looking at some of the opportunities AI could create in Hong Kong. We estimate that faster AI-enabled R&D alone could create an additional HK$8.6 billion (US$1.1 billion) in economic value by 2040. Realising the wider opportunity will mean helping smaller businesses adopt AI, enabling people to move beyond basic use, and building confidence through relevant skills and effective safeguards.
Here are five opportunities and priorities from AI we looked at in Hong Kong:
Helping SMBs capture more of the AI dividend.
If SMBs adopted AI at the same rate as large enterprises, they could unlock HK$65 billion (US$8.4 billion) in additional value by 2035. This catch-up in adoption could be equivalent to or adding 76,000 extra workers.
Moving from basic use to confident use.
Among the online adults sampled in Hong Kong, 26% are “light users” of AI, using it mainly for simple chat and drafting; 47% are “intermediate users”; and 21% qualify as “AI Super Users”.
Accelerating research and discovery.
AI systems could help scientists and researchers in Hong Kong explore twice as many plausible hypotheses each year, increasing the chances of breakthrough discoveries in the private and public sectors.
Giving workers the training they actually want.
In our polling, 28% of workers wanted to better understand how AI models work, 37% wanted more practical use cases, and 43% wanted to know how to prompt AI models more effectively.
Building trust through stronger safeguards.
In our polling, more than 85% of people in Hong Kong said it was important for AI developers to incorporate safeguards such as pre-release testing, independent verification, and greater protection for children and other vulnerable users.
The factsheet also looks at how AI could reinforce Hong Kong’s position as an open, services-led economy. AI could help SMBs unlock HK$590 billion in additional export income, bring an additional 3.3 million international tourists to Hong Kong every year, and lift financial-services productivity by 6.6%, contributing HK$54 billion to GVA. AI-assisted creative tools could generate a further HK$12 billion in annual value by 2035.
Some of the largest long-term gains could begin in the classroom. AI tutors and learning tools could lift student attainment by 11%, supporting an economy that is 9.3% larger by 2050, worth an additional HK$320 billion. AI could also free up 5.6 hours per week for each teacher and help narrow the attainment gap between Hong Kong’s lowest and median-performing students by 32%.
AI-assisted product development could allow Hong Kong start-ups to release new features 1.7 times faster than today. With the right skills, safeguards and support for adoption, AI can help Hong Kong turn its existing strengths into wider productivity growth, more competitive businesses and everyday benefits for citizens.