The global space economy is undergoing a historic transformation — from a government-dominated sector of a few state actors to a dynamic, commercialized frontier driven by private enterprise (as exemplified by Elon Musk’s SpaceX). This is coupled with the increasing need for coordinated international collaboration to address urgent space sustainability challenges and the future viability of the entire low-Earth orbit ecosystem, which hosts the majority of space satellites and where most of what is referred to as the NewSpace economy operates. This is projected to exceed $1.5 trillion by 2035, according to the World Economic Forum. As director of the University of Hong Kong’s (HKU) Laboratory for Space Research (LSR), I write to underscore Hong Kong’s unique opportunity to become a global leader in “space sustainability” while capitalizing on the NewSpace revolution. However, this will only be possible if we act with urgency and adopt a strategic vision. On Feb 2, Singapore announced the establishment of a national space agency, overtaking the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region’s nascent plans for its own space office. However, we have more cards to play, indeed, a winning hand, but we must be at the table.

Hong Kong has several major strategic advantages with unique characteristics that, when combined, put us in an unparalleled position to play a pivotal role. These include our status as a global financial center, a legal, compliance and arbitration hub (under common law), an investment powerhouse, an intellectual-property pillar, an insurance leader, a tertiary education power, and a gateway to China, with English as the global language for managing all of the above. All this gives us remarkable opportunities in the following areas:

i) Commercial space finance and investment — facilitating capital flows for satellite constellations, launch services, and space tech startups.

ii) Cross-border collaboration — bridging Chinese mainland’s rapidly expanding space programs, including those of the China National Space Administration (CNSA), the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, and private firms like Galactic Energy and Spacety, with global markets.

iii) Space sustainability imperatives — addressing the critical challenges of orbital debris, space traffic management, and responsible and sustainable space operations.

A key element of the SAR’s emerging status is the actions of its top, globally elite universities, led by HKU but with major contributions from two other highly ranked tertiary education powerhouses, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST) and the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. These three universities are all very active in space research and development, so we are not just theorizing — we are building Hong Kong’s space capabilities and providing academic and research leadership that influences and percolates through to the wider space economy. We have direct participation in several mainland space missions to the moon and Mars. As examples, LSR has an international payload on Chang’e 7 — a small wide field optical telescope on the lunar lander due to touch down in November, along with our International Lunar Observatory Association (Hawaii) partners, while HKUST has a robotic lunar rover for Chang’e 8. Six Hong Kong universities recently benefited from the SAR government’s HK$100 million ($12.8 million) one-off “aerospace call”, with my own group receiving more than a third of the funding for a 12U lunar-orbit CubeSat nanosatellite in 2028-29 to observe light “flashes” from micrometeorite impacts on the moon for threat assessment to lunar habitation. Indeed, active collaboration between our top universities and the nation’s space program is one of the main drivers of broader growth in the sector.

One very real opportunity would be to create a global hub in Hong Kong for space sustainability, perhaps organized as an NGO. It would cover areas such as a major data center for orbital debris tracking, with artificial-intelligence-driven solutions for collision avoidance, and a satellite data repository for environmental, social, and governance and climate finance, via partnering with Hong Kong’s financial sector to leverage space-based remote-sensing data analytics. The explosive growth of satellite mega-constellations (such as Starlink and Guowang) has made space sustainability a trillion-dollar challenge. Hong Kong is uniquely positioned to lead in:

Singapore, Luxembourg, and the United Arab Emirates are already investing heavily in space sustainability and the NewSpace economy. Hong Kong cannot afford to dawdle. By combining the HKSAR’s research excellence across our universities and appropriate government support, we can position Hong Kong as the global nexus for responsible space commerce

i) Space policy and governance and developing frameworks for debris mitigation, satellite licensing, and space traffic coordination.

ii) Sustainable space finance by creating insurance products, green bonds, and investment standards for responsible space ventures.

iii) Global collaboration including hosting international forums, standards bodies, and public-private partnerships to address space sustainability issues.

So I am issuing an urgent “call to action” with a three-point plan that can secure our role:

i) A Hong Kong space office should be established as soon as possible. This should be an umbrella organization for supporting HKSAR-related space, NewSpace and space sustainability activities.

ii) A well-resourced, ongoing, space innovation fund (an extension of the government’s one-off Innovation and Technology Support Programme aerospace call) should be launched, dedicated to funding research-and-development and payload development in our universities but with support for relevant space startups and with a special focus on space sustainability.

iii) A “space sustainability task force” should be created to seize the mainland opportunities on offer and establish a Hong Kong international space sustainability hub, ideally under a new NGO, that would align with CNSA, the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs and global regulators on orbital debris standards. It could also serve as a Hong Kong space-tech accelerator, including a physical location for startups, investors, and university researchers to share, with a focus on sustainable space solutions, perhaps based at Cyberport 5 or the Science Park.

The time to act is now. Singapore, Luxembourg, and the United Arab Emirates are already investing heavily in space sustainability and the NewSpace economy. Hong Kong cannot afford to dawdle. By combining the HKSAR’s research excellence across our universities and appropriate government support, we can position Hong Kong as the global nexus for responsible space commerce. We can turn this vision into reality. The next decade in space will define the next century of economic growth — Hong Kong must claim its leading position.

The author is director of the Lab for Space Research, The University of Hong Kong.

The views do not necessarily reflect those of China Daily.