Renowned world scientist plays critical role in the SAR’s bid to be a regional inno-tech hub by propelling the digital economy. Jessica Chen reports from Hong Kong.

Wang Yang (right), vice-president of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, gives an interview to Aden Su, a journalist from China Daily Hong Kong Edition’s Junior Scoop program, in July. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)

Time flies. Wang Yang — a world-leading scholar in pure and interdisciplinary mathematics — was already in his 10th year of service at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology when he granted a young journalist a special interview on a sizzling summer afternoon.

Sitting with Aden Su in his office with a view of the sea, Wang shared his thoughts on mathematics, a subject for highbrows, and the trend toward “embracing the GBA” — Hong Kong’s integration into the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area — for China Daily Hong Kong Edition’s Junior Scoop program, which views the city from a young person’s perspective.

Back in 2014, Wang, then a department head and professor of mathematics at Michigan State University, was invited by two universities — one in the United States and the other in Hong Kong — to advance his research. He chose HKUST and started everything anew in the special administrative region after having lived in the US for three decades. It was a big decision, but his choice was simple — “the future is in China” was a widely accepted commonsense view held within the academic world a decade ago.

Riding the wave to the East, Wang was visionary and bold. In Hong Kong, he proved his mastery in digitizing HKUST in Clear Water Bay. In Guangzhou, the debut of the gleaming, chic HKUST(Guangzhou) campus, a mammoth 30-billion-yuan ($4.16-billion) project, has paved the way for the university to the upper north GBA. With its twin campuses, HKUST, one of the best young universities in the world with slightly over 30 years of history, aims to stand tall as an emerging academic conglomerate.

Aside from his daunting mission, Wang set a record for the number of papers he had published in journals in pandemic-stricken Hong Kong. When HKUST(GZ), for which Wang drove faculty recruitment, launched its initial operations last year, the professor had produced 16 publications that year, on subjects ranging from pure mathematics to biomathematics, hitting a peak in his academic career.

Besides advancing the “new front lines” of the Greater Bay Area, Wang, a Harvard graduate, wants to claim Hong Kong’s dominant position in the virtual realm — the metaverse. To start with, HKUST launched the MetaHKUST project on its campuses with a slew of “digitalization measures”, ranging from merging both universities, some 130 kilometers apart, into one organic virtual campus, to issuing diplomas in digital format with unique blockchain marks. 

For Wang, MetaHKUST is a starter in testing the waters. The ultimate goal is to turn Hong Kong into a top-notch institution in the metaverse. Over the years, he has said the city has “all the elements required for future-shaping development of Web3 amidst the rapid convergence of the physical and digital realms”. The scientist is now one of the highest-profile leaders in advancing the promising and burgeoning digital industry in the SAR and beyond.

The SAR government has placed the development of information and technology on top of its agenda in urban planning. The proposed Northern Metropolis and Lok Ma Chau Loop have their sights set on becoming regional technology hubs.

Data flow and the free flow of personnel, materials and funds are seen as the fundamentals for success in boosting economic growth in Hong Kong and other GBA cities. According to Wang, transforming Hong Kong, a place he now calls home, into the “greatest city” in the metaverse realm will make the most of Hong Kong’s potential in research, finance and its position as the gateway that links the Chinese mainland with the rest of the world.

By prioritizing the development and promotion of the digital economy driven by the Web3 ecosystem, the SAR government can give the city a prosperous future with an upgraded economic structure and limitless opportunities to create value in daily life, said Wang.

Promising as it is, the digital economy’s ecology seems elusive to Su — an eighth grade student who dreams of becoming a doctor. Wang explained it to Su with a holistic picture of the regional division in the Greater Bay Area. 

“Hong Kong, with its 7 million people, is relatively small. So, when the innovation has been done by students of HKUST, it needs an ecosystem to be translated into marketable products and then link it with the rest of the world, especially the mainland, both for the market and supplies,” the professor told Su, who found the sight of a smart drone jaw-dropping.

The drone, with vision capabilities, is one of the latest innovation products of the Cheng Kar-Shun Robotics Institute, one of HKUST’s best research institutes. The drone allowed Su to “play Jedi”: When he waved his hands up, the drone in the air would follow the motions of his hands as if he were a young Jedi in a Star Wars movie.

Su obviously enjoyed and was enlightened by Wang’s fatherly explanations and introduction. According to Wang, Hong Kong’s integration into the Greater Bay Area has opened up a whole front of new opportunities for innovators to collaborate with a larger number of researchers and entrepreneurs on the mainland. Being part of a big plan allows the SAR to pursue value-driven growth by capitalizing on its strengths and contributing its best.

Junior Scoop is an all-media program produced by China Daily Hong Kong Edition. While filming the program, Wang poured out his love for and expectations of the city’s youth, saying that open-mindedness is healthy for their growth and for the city as well.

Contact the writer at jessicachen@chinadailyhk.com