Benoît Apercé, a national of France, joined the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 2011. He is currently Assistant Program Officer in the Madrid Information and Promotion Division, Madrid Registry, Brands and Designs Sector, where he contributes to the development of global promotional activities and products for the WIPO’s International Trademark System.

Prior to joining WIPO, Benoît worked on technical cooperation projects at the Association of Caribbean States in Trinidad and Tobago, and at the Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, France, during which time he served in Haiti and in the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela.

Benoît graduated from the Institute of Political Studies of Toulouse in 2004 and holds a Master’s Degree in Comparative Political Sciences from the Political Studies Institute of Aix-en-Provence in France.

Habip Asan has been President of the Turkish Patent and Trademark Office since October 2008.

Dr. Asan has been a member of Administrative Council of European Patent Organization since 2008. He was elected Deputy-Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the European Patent Academy in November 2009 and served as the Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the European Patent Academy from 2011 to 2012. He has been a member of Board-28 in EPO since 2015. He has been elected as the Chairman of the Technical and Operational Support Committee of the EPO in 2016 for three years.

Dr. Asan holds a Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Mechanical Engineering from Texas Tech University, USA.

In 1994, he was appointed assistant professor of Mechanical Engineering at Karadeniz Technical University. He became associate professor in 2000. During 2003-2005, he lectured at Ajman University of Science and Technology in Dubai. In 2005, he was appointed professor at Karadeniz Technical University. He has been teaching Advanced Patent Law and Advanced Design Law at the Ankara University under the LLM program on Intellectual Property jointly organized by World Intellectual Property Organization and Turkish Patent and Trademark Office since 2016.

He has published more than 50 articles in different journals. He has supervised many Ph.D. and M.Sc. students and led several research projects. Dr. Asan is married and father of three children. He speaks fluent English.

Chris Au Young leads a number of innovative developments to transform the Hong Kong International Airport into an airport of the future. He actively engages airlines, ACI, IATA, technology leaders, universities and research institutions to shape the future travel experience and drive for operational excellence.

Joined the Airport Authority since 2006, Chris has extensive experience in airport management including airfield, baggage, terminal systems, airport flow and runway capacity. Prior to that, he was the Regional Project Manager in North East Asia at TNT Express. He also spent 10 years at Accenture, a world leading management and IT consultancy firm, and delivered a number of business transformational projects for Fortune 500 companies.

Chris is a Board Member of the Zhuhai Airport Management Company, representative of HKIA in the ACI World Airport IT Standing Committee, member of the Expert Review Panel in the Hong Kong R&D Centre for Logistics and Supply Chain Management Enabling Technologies (LSCM), and a member of the HKIE in Logistics & Transportation Discipline. He holds an MBA degree and a Bachelor degree in Computer Engineering.

Since April 2016, Gustav Brismark has been responsible for Ericsson’s patent development and patent licensing worldwide. With over 42,000 granted patents, Ericsson is one of the companies holding the strongest radio communication patent portfolios in the industry covering 2G, 3G, 4G and soon 5G cellular standards.

Brismark and his team are responsible for creating a return on investment in Ericsson technology and securing continued value growth by patenting the inventions of Ericsson engineers. The team provides access to Ericsson technology through a FRAND licensing program, while at the same time protecting the intellectual property of Ericsson’s products.

Brismark was Vice President Patent Strategies and Portfolio Management from 2006 until 2016. Before that, he was Vice President of Patent Development. His career also spans international experience, including a two-year stint in Japan.

In the 1990’s, Brismark worked in WCDMA research and product management and was notably active in two international research projects on 3G mobile communication, sponsored by the European Commission.

Brismark has been a key contributor to Ericsson’s patent business as an integral part of a global business, with more than 100 revenue-generating license agreements worldwide. He has worked on FRAND licensing policy in ETSI, and other Standards Development Organizations. He has also participated as an expert for Ericsson in media and various legal fora, explaining our business strategies as well as Ericsson's FRAND licensing practices.

He is co-inventor on a number of patents related to algorithm research for 2G/3G systems for mobile communication and was inventor on ten patents related to GSM and WCDMA technology.

Brismark has worked at Ericsson since 1986, after receiving his MSc degree in Physics Engineering from Uppsala University, Sweden.

Dirk Brown is the Faculty Director of the University of South Carolina’s McNair Institute for Entrepreneurism and Free Enterprise and a faculty member in the Management Department at the Darla Moore School of Business. Dr. Brown is a seasoned executive with a strong track record of developing, marketing and licensing disruptive, proprietary technologies. He is the founding CEO of Pandoodle Corporation, a digital media technology company with offices in California, New York and South Carolina.

Previously, he was CEO of Neoconix, a venture capital-funded electronics technology company serving Fortune 100 customers with worldwide sales and manufacturing. Earlier in his career, Dr. Brown was Executive Vice President of Operations and Marketing at High Connection Density, with P&L responsibility for all of the company’s product lines, and before that a member of technical staff at Advanced Micro Devices.

He hold over 25 patents, has written over 30 technical papers and journal articles, and is an active member in a number of professional societies. Dr. Brown holds an MBA from San Jose State, a Ph.D. (Materials Science) and M.Eng. (Applied Physics) from Cornell University and a B.Sc. (Eng.) in Applied Physics/Electrical Engineering from Queen’s University in Canada.

Mr. Guilherme Vargas Castilhos is a Brazilian practitioner lawyer specialized in international economic issues, namely the legal aspects concerning foreign investment between China and Latin America.

As a certified and enrolled member of the Brazilian Bar Association (Ordem dos Advogados do Brasil) and an overseas legal manager of Macao Intellectual Property Agent Co. Ltd., he assists clients in various legal issues involving the operation of foreign investments and duly protection of their Intellectual property rights in different jurisdictions.

Previously, he was an associate of the International Law Department of Martinelli Advogados (one of the leading law firms in Brazil), he participated in projects involving the incorporation and maintenance of Brazilian investments in China and foreign companies in Brazil.

Currently living in Shanghai, and with more than 3 years residing in China, Mr. Guilherme has experience and acquaintance to many aspects of Chinese culture and legal system. He is an S.J.D at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University (China), LL.M at the University of Macau (Macau SAR, China) and holder of a bachelor in law by the Federal University of Pelotas (Brazil).

Dr. Albert Wai-Kit Chan is the Managing Partner of the Law Offices of Albert Wai-Kit Chan, PLLC. He is a former research scientist who forged his legal career by combining his training as a molecular biologist with the emerging legal needs of the biotechnology industry in the late 1980s. Dr. Chan handles all areas of intellectual property law (including technology transfer, patents, trademarks, copyrights, business transactions, and trade secrets), and his specialty is biotechnology patents. He is well-versed in all aspects of prosecution and litigation and is experienced in licensing, technology transfer and the evaluation of intellectual property portfolios. Dr. Chan works extensively with both U.S. ad international companies. He has helped scores of scientists and inventors obtain the intellectual property protection they need to be competitive in their fields. His clients range from individual inventors, up-and-coming companies to well-established prestigious research institutes.

Dr. Chan has been frequently involved in transactional work in China, which includes facilitating joint ventures and contracts between East and West companies and building up clients’ intellectual property portfolios. For those clients looking to expand their business in China, he has not only provided patent procurement services but also, equally important, patent enforcement. He has performed analysis and evaluation of clients’ intellectual property to determine the scope and securement of the protection of their intellectual property.

From 1996 to 2013, Dr. Chan was an Adjunct Professor of Law at the City University of New York School of Law. His classes included intellectual property law, patent law, technology transfer, Internet and the law, food and drug law, and international business law. He is currently Adjunct Associate Professor in the School of Life Sciences at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and has adjunct professorship in the Department of Health Technology and Informatics at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. Dr. Chan is active in a number of legal organizations including, among others, United States-China Intellectual Property Institute, Inc. (a New York Not-For-Profit-Corporation) where he is Founder and Director.

Dr. Chan received his J.D. degree from Columbia University School of Law in New York. He has awarded his Ph.D. in virology at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, and he completed his postdoctoral training at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York as an American Cancer Society postdoctoral fellow. Dr. Chan is a graduate of the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and he was born and raised in Hong Kong.

Mr Barry Chan has over 20 years of experience in consultation and information technology in Hong Kong. His expertise is in leading fintech strategy consultation and end-to-end business solutions implementation, bringing sustainable business value to banks and financial institutions.

Mr. Chan is a Partner of Woo Kwan Lee & Lo. He advises in both contentious and non-contentious aspects of intellectual property including copyright, trade marks, patents, designs, passing off, confidentiality, media, entertainment, personal data privacy as well as general commercial and civil litigation matters. Before joining his current firm, Mr. Chan was the in-house legal counsel of a multi-national entertainment company responsible for advising on different aspects of the company's operation with focus on intellectual property, marketing and advertising, and personal data privacy. Mr Chan had also served as a Government lawyer in the Intellectual Property Department of the Hong Kong SAR Government where he was deployed in advising the HKSAR Government on intellectual property issues, advising and examining on registrability of trade marks, conducting registrability and other hearings and delivering written decisions for the Intellectual Property Department.

Mr Chan is currently a Member of the Intellectual Property Committee of The Law Society of Hong Kong.

Eric Chang joined Microsoft Research Asia (MSR Asia) in July 1999 to work in the area of speech technologies. Eric is currently the Senior Director of Technology Strategy and Communications of MSR Asia, where his responsibilities include communications, IP portfolio management, and driving new research themes such as eHealth and urban informatics.

Prior to his new responsibilities at MSR Asia, Eric co-founded Microsoft Advanced Technology Center (ATC) in 2003 as the Assistant Managing Director. At ATC, Eric led teams to ship features for Windows and Windows Mobile and started a multi-disciplinary incubation team. Previously, Eric was the research manager of the speech group at MSR Asia and the acting University Relations Director for one year. A technology transfer result from his group is the Chinese version of Office XP, which incorporates the Mandarin speech recognition engine developed at Microsoft Research Asia.

Prior to joining Microsoft Research, Eric was one of the founding members of the Research group at Nuance Communications, a pioneer in natural speech interface software for telecommunication systems. While at Nuance, Eric worked on various projects involving confidence score generation, acoustic modeling, and robust speech detection. He also led the technical effort to develop the Japanese version of the Nuance product. This project led to the world’s first deployed Japanese natural language speech recognition system.

Eric has also developed speech recognition algorithms at M.I.T. Lincoln Laboratory, invented a new circuit optimization technique at Toshiba ULSI Research Center, and conducted pattern recognition research at General Electric Corporate Research and Development Center.

Eric graduated from M.I.T. with Ph.D., Master and Bachelor degrees, all in the field of electrical engineering and computer science. While at M.I.T., he was inducted into the honorary societies Tau Beta Pi and Sigma Xi.

Eric has published papers in the fields of eHealth, speech processing, and machine learning in various journals and conferences. He is the author of several granted and pending patents. His research interests are spoken language understanding, machine learning, and signal processing.

Peter Cheung is a Hong Kong practising Barrister, a former Director of the Intellectual Property, and a former Registrar of Patents, Trade Marks, Designs and Copyright Licensing Bodies, Hong Kong, China.

From 1992-2013, Mr Cheung represented Hong Kong in World Intellectual Property Organization conferences. As a World Trade Organization Dispute Settlement Panelist, he settled two international disputes concerning trade marks and geographical indications. He was the lead intellectual property negotiator in Hong Kong’s first bilateral free-trade agreetments. He promoted international trading of intellectual property via Hong Kong.

Mr Cheung was twice a Government Legal Scholar. His academic qualifications include: BA, LLB, PCLL, LLM and LLM Int L. He graduated from Harvard Kennedy School’s Senior Executive Fellows Program. He was twice an invited speaker in Harvard’s Asia Business Conferences. He also spoke in domain name conferences hosted in Hong Kong.

Mr Cheung writes songs and produces music videos. He holds positions as Arbitrator of the Shenzhen Court of International Arbitration; Knowledge Transfer Committee Member of the Hong Kong University of Science & Technology Council, and Co-chair of The Dot Trademark Policy Committee. He publishes blog posts on decentralized ledger technology or blockchain, focusing on its business applications.

Stephanie Cheung is a Solicitor and Notary Public in Hong Kong, and also qualified in UK, and Australia (Territory of New South Wales).

Stephanie has practised as a Solicitor for over 42 years in Hong Kong covering litigation to commercial work. In the field of Intellectual Property, she processes registration work, as well as infringement litigation, and also advising on and drafting contractual documents for IP exploitation such as licensing, franchising, assignments, sponsorships and financing etc.

She is an Accredited Mediator (General) & (Family) by HK Law Society, HKIAC & HKMAAL, Arbitrator with (HKIArb).

She has conducted mediation for cases in the High Court and the Copyright Tribunal on disputes involving trademarks, patents, copyright and registered designs, licensing arrangements, sale of goods, and other commercial disputes.

She serves on the Intellectual Property Mediation Working Group and is Vice-Chair of the Commercial Mediation Interest Group under the HK Mediation Council of the Hong Kong International Arbitration Centre. She is also current Chair of the Guidance Committee of the Law Society of Hong Kong.

A Hong Kong native, Mr. Chia has spent his life living in the United States, Britain, Australia and the Chinese mainland; Achieving academic success at the University of New South Wales, INSEAD and Tsinghua University, Mr. Chia’s international background has influenced and informed his career, enabling an uniquely multi-cultural eye for e-commerce innovation.

Now, as a globally recognized pioneer in the online business, Mr. Chia attributes his success to his passion for innovation and understanding of geographical needs and opportunities.

Mr. Chia is currently a Venture Partner of Sequoia Capital China. He was former Vice-president and Head of Data Committee of Alibaba Group in which he led his data team to complete a series of important achievements and drive the company to become a data company. Before joining Alibaba, he was the Chief Product Officer of DHgate which is a cross-border eCommerce platform in China. Before that, Mr. Chia also worked for eBay, MSN, PCCW, and HSBC.

Other responsibilities:
1) Vice Chairman, Big Data Branch, China Information Industry Association;
2) Deputy Director, Expert Committee of China Computer Federation;
3) Education Steering Committee (for big data projects), Tsinghua University;
4) Adjunct Professor, School of Management, Zhejiang University.

Ms Livia Chiu Wai Ching was a graduate from the Chinese University of Hong Kong followed by a Bachelor of Law degree from the Manchester Metropolitan University.

Ms Chiu joined the Intellectual Property Department of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region in 1992 and has participated in different areas of work such as examination of trademark applications, development of IT project, promotion of e-business services, assistance in managing promotion activities in respect of IP trading, assistance in managing networking activities with the Mainland authorities/organisations.

Alan is the Managing Partner of the IP boutique law firm Ella Cheong & Alan Chiu, Solicitors & Notaries, and the founder and CEO of Alan & Associates, a fast-growing IP Agency with offices in both Hong Kong and Beijing.

Recognized by Asian Legal Business as one of the top lawyers under the age of 40 in Asia, Alan was also ranked as an IP Star by the Managing IP 4 years in a row. He is renowned for his IP litigation and enforcement practice and was awarded "IP Lawyer of the Year 2017" by LawyerIssue Award. His law firm was also recently shortlisted by Asia IP for the "Hong Kong Trademark Firm of the Year 2017".

Apart from IP litigation and anti-counterfeiting, Alan also focuses on IP portfolio and strategies, IP licensing, franchising, advertising and trade description, product labelling and safety, data privacy, computer forensic, internet security, e-commerce, as well as IP mediation and arbitration. In particular, Alan successfully handled a number of headline IP litigation in Hong Kong and many convoluted cross-border IP disputes for international luxury brands, technology giants and food and beverages sector.

Alan is a China-Appointed Attesting Officer, an accredited mediator, a Civil Celebrant of Marriages and an Adjunct Professor of Law appointed by Hong Kong Shue Yan University. He is also a member of the Technology Committee of the Law Society of Hong Kong and a member of the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal Panel. He is a frequent speaker - he delivered over 80 talks sharing his insights on a diversified range of IP and technology topics covering both Hong Kong and China.

Prof. Choy, Founder and President of Toy2R Group Limited, master of toy creation and brand design director of Qee. He is committed to promoting the concept ‘Everyone Can Design’, as well as implementing ‘Qee Do-It-Yourself Series’ which attracts designers and collectors from all over the world. Due to the great success of Qee which has been auctioned by two well-known auction houses, Sotheby and Christie’s, Prof. Choy is recognized as one of the top international designers for his outstanding achievement in both design and business management. The splendid case of Toy2R inspired lots of academic research institutes. Richard Ivey School of Business, University of Western Ontario and Harvard Business School take Toy2R’s case as teaching materials for MBA and senior undergraduate courses about resources acquisition in different stages in an entrepreneurship course.

With his creativity and business sense, Prof. Choy is keen on co-operating with numerous brands, ranging from TonySame in the eyewear industry, well-known jewelery brand Forevermark, Adidas in the sports industry, electrical technology brands like Sony and Panasonic, Watsons and Shu Uemura in health and beauty field, to Bank of China and Hospital Authority. Merging toys and arts, Qee has been successfully brought into different social classes.

With his passion and persistence in the creative industry, Prof. Choy has won countless awards, including “Global Excellence Awards - Most Outstanding Designer Toy Company 2017” , ”Top Ten Leaders of Excellence Award 2016” , “Best Designer Toy Company Hong Kong 2016” , “Best Property Award of Hong Kong Licensing Awards 2016” , “Hall of Fame Designer Toy Awards 2015” , “Award of Asia Pacific Most Responsible Economic Leader 2013” , “Winner of Outstanding Society Contribution Award 2012” , “Premier Asian Licensing Award - Best Brand and Design License 2012” , “China Marketing Master Award 2011” , “Distinguished Chinese Award 2011” , “Outstanding Greater China Design Award 2010” , “Hong Kong Ten Outstanding Designers Award 2009" , “Asia Pacific Business Awards - The Most Promising Entrepreneurship Award 2009”. Not to be neglected, Prof. Choy also received the "Hong Kong Awards for Industries - Grand Award Winner for Innovation & Creativity" in 2008, which is a business award given by the Hong Kong Trade and Industry Department and seven major business groups.

Trevor is a Senior Manager at Innovation and Technology Development Office of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University (PolyU), responsible for managing and executing strategies on Intellectual Property generated by faculty members and researchers.

He joined PolyU as an Intellectual Property Specialist in 2009, helping researchers in drafting and prosecuting patent applications.

Trevor also taught IP-related courses as a visiting lecturer at the University.

Prior to that, Trevor worked as a patent agent at the Intellectual Property Division of Canon in the United States, a company routinely ranked among the top 5 patent recipients in Japan and the United States.

Trevor is a registered U.S. Patent Agent and holds a Computer Engineering degree from the University of California at Irvine.

Douglas Clark is a Hong Kong barrister who specializes in intellectual property litigation. He was previously (as a solicitor) Managing Partner of the Hogan Lovells’ Shanghai office and was based in Shanghai from 2000 to 2011. He has advised clients on numerous cross border litigation cases and also sat as an arbitrator in a number of intellectual property related cases.

Doug is an adjunct professor in the Faculty of Law of the University of Hong Kong where he teaches Hong Kong Intellectual Property Law as part of the LLM program.

Doug is the author Patent Litigation in China (OUP) and the General Editor and co-author of Hong Kong Intellectual Property (LexisNexis). He has also written a history of British and American extraterritorality in China and Japan, Gunboat Justice.

Stephane graduated in France in 1997 with an Engineering post graduate degree specialized in Industrialization. Upon graduation he joined the booming IT market and specialized quickly in Business Intelligence (BI). From there he assisted different companies to implement actionable BI for 20 years in Luxury Retail with Richemont Group (France) and Chanel (Hong Kong), Home Appliance with Darty (France) and in Transportation industries with Cathay Pacific (Hong Kong).

He is nowadays delivering value and innovation with his Research and Technology team at Thales Group in Hong Kong, and they are using this Big Data thingy that some talk about.

Married with two kids, he arrived in Hong Kong in 2011 following his wife. He is a book lover that likes to keep in touch with his tech side. He is also a traveler discovering different cultures and likes to stay at home playing board games with friends.

Ms Margaret Fong is the Executive Director of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) since 1 October 2014. With a global network of over 40 offices, Ms Fong heads this international team whose mission is to create and facilitate opportunities in global trade for Hong Kong-based companies. She joined the HKTDC in 2010 as Deputy Executive Director, responsible for the international promotion of Hong Kong’s product and service industries and the Council’s office network worldwide.

Ms Fong has worked in a variety of public service posts, beginning her career as an Administrative Officer with the Hong Kong Government. From 1997 to 1999, she served as Deputy Director-General in the Washington Economic and Trade Office of the Hong Kong SAR Government.

She was Deputy Secretary for Transport from 1999 to 2004, Director-General of the Washington Economic and Trade Office from 2004 to 2006, and Commissioner for Economic and Trade Affairs, USA, from 2006 to 2008, representing the Hong Kong SAR Government in the United States. Before joining the HKTDC, Ms Fong was the Commissioner for Tourism from November 2008 to the end of 2009. She is a graduate of the University of Hong Kong.

Ms Fong is a member of the Working Group on Convention and Exhibition Industries and Tourism under the Economic Development Commission, the Aviation Development and Three-runway System Advisory Committee, the Hong Kong Maritime Industry Council, the Hong Kong Maritime and Port Board, the Hong Kong Logistics Development Council, the Hong Kong Tourism Board, and the Financial Services Development Council.

Tony Gao, EntGroup Partner, General Manager of East China. He is EntGroup IP and content marketing data product line leader, with rich film and television data analysis, and entertainment industry research and consulting experience. Focusing on the study and insights of entertainment and consumption of young generation, he has written more than 20 influential reports annually such as "Fan Economy Research", "Post-95 Network Reading Study" and "Trend Analysis of Film and Television Industry in the Age of Consumer Upgrade". At the same, he is time leading the implementation of Huace, Yuewen, iQiyi, Coca-Cola and other well-known companies for data analysis and research consulting projects.

Majored in Directing, Xiaonan graduated from the Central Academy of Drama. She was the CEO of the Heaven Pictures Inc., that was well-known for making of art films. She was executive producer of the documentary “River Road” which was nominated in Tokyo International Film Festival.

As a host and event planner to promote movie culture for years, Xiaonan has hosted culture forums and movie saloons by inviting many of movie celebrities, scholars and the like.

Xiaonan has more than 10 years of publishing experience, and won multiple awards for the books that she published.

Long engaged in film production, book publishing and social media, as well as pop culture, Xiaonan has gained sharp observations and developed unique insights in these fields. Now, Xiaonan is engaged in social media on film production, film reviewing, film data analysis and film education.

Heinz Goddar, Prof., Dr., a German Patent Attorney and European Patent and Trademark Attorney, is a partner of Boehmert & Boehmert, with his office at Munich, Germany. Technical background (as well as PhD degree) in physics, with a focus on polymer physics. He teaches Patent and Licensing Law as an Honorary Professor at the University of Bremen, Germany, as a Lecturer at the Munich Intellectual Property Law Center (MIPLC), Munich, Germany, as a Visiting Professor at the University of Washington, Seattle, WA, U.S.A., and the National ChengChi University, Taipei, and as a Consultant Professor at the University of Huazhong, Wuhan, China. He is a member of the Advisory Board of the Tongji Global Intellectual Property Institute (TGIPI), Shanghai, China. Prof. Dr. Goddar is an Adjunct Professor and an Honorable Consultant in International Legal Services at the National Yunlin University of Science and Technology, Yunlin, Taiwan. He is also a Director at the Global Institute of Intellectual Property (GIIP), Delhi. He is a Past President of LES International and of LES Germany and has received the Gold Medal of LES International. In 2014 he has been inducted into the IP Hall of Fame. Contact and further information: goddar@boehmert.de, http://www.boehmert.de.

Douglas currently is CEO of Ideation Inc which has built a software tool that allows any organization to build their own white labelled innovation ecosystem. Prior to this, he restructured Circle Trust an $8.5 billion bank and stayed on as Chairman and CEO through three successive owners. He was a Managing Director at KPMG responsible for Financial Services, e-Commerce and CyberSecurity and led several large industry infrastructure projects including NetAid (1700 servers in five continents), Furs.com, NICC (Newspaper Industry Clearing Center) and OASIS that deregulated the wholesale electrical industry and for which he won a Gartner award.

He has written two books for Wiley – the first Building the Corporate Intranet on secure Internet architectures that was translated to three languages and Ideation: The Birth & Death of Ideas that was well reviewed by Carl Icahn and Lee Iacocca. He is inventor on five patents (one with 260 citations) and is interested in innovation management, big data analytics, cybersecurity, funds management, blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies.

Paul specialises in technology (including telecoms and data protection), and advises clients on both non-contentious issues and disputes.

Paul is head of the TMT practice, and works across Asia spending time in China, Singapore and Japan. He's a regular speaker on technology matters, most recently advising organisations what they should to if they suspect they have been the victim of a data breach, and is often quoted in the press for his views on legal developments in the technology sphere.

Paul has extensive experience of advising in relation to commercial contracts, outsourcing arrangements, complex IT and telecoms projects and the disputes that can arise from these. Paul is especially known for providing level-headed, commercial advice in pressured environments, as well as his personal interest in technology and technological developments.

He lectures regularly in Asia, most recently on the topics of restrictive covenants, cyber security, cloud computing, data protection and social media.

Experience
• Acting for a global telecoms network provider in a dispute relating to the roll-out of a new network in Hong Kong
• Advising an IT supplier on claims against the Hong Kong government
• Advising on the troubled implementation of a new public safety network in Oslo, which is the biggest implementations of its type in Scandinavia
• Advising an IT supplier on claims and potential liability relating to a troubled delivery of a new supply chain system
• Advising a Hong Kong entity on the risks involved with the procurement of cloud computing services
• Advising on and managing a major Asia-wide restructuring project
• Advising a leading information technology provider on possible claims in relation to the wrongful termination of its role in a UK NHS project
• Advising a global sourcing company on claims arising out of the sourcing of goods in Hong Kong and China
• Advising the UK Home Office on the procurement and implementation of an IT system integral to a multi-billion pound immigration programme
• Advising on the purchase and liability associated with a marketing database provider
• Advising a data centre business on a data centre services agreement with a major airline.
• Advising the Competition Commission, an independent statutory body established to enforce the provisions of the Competition Ordinance which recently came into force in December 2015. Paul advised the Commission on the drafting of its data protection policy as well as its Personal Information Collection Statement (PICS) that will be issued to all individuals providing personal data to the Commission. The Commission wanted to ensure that it retained as much operational discretion as possible, while remaining compliant with the requirements of the Personal Data (Privacy) Ordinance, in respect of how the Commission uses information received from different channels.
• Advising a communications infrastructure developer on a number arising out of a project with MTR corporation owned Traxcomm Limited including: (a) the transfer of a network pursuant to a fibre IRU agreement; (b) issues arising out of delays in obtaining a block licence to install and operate the network; (c) possible transfer of operations relating to the fibre network.
• Advising Standard Life on Asia-wide data protection issues, in particular updating the company's website legal and privacy statements to ensure compliance with both Hong Kong and English data protection laws in particular where personal data may be shared/transferred between multinational group companies.

Paul is on the board for TEDX Wan Chai, where he takes part in arranging their yearly TEDX event bringing together speakers from around the globe to Hong Kong.

Mr. HE Hua was graduated with engineering bachelor degree from the Chemistry Engineering Department of Tian Jin University.

After graduation, he worked in the Patent Office under the State Intellectual Property Office of P. R. China (SIPO), continuously as Patent Examiner, Deputy Division Director, Division Director and Deputy Department Director General. Afterwards, he was responsible for the Patent Examination Assistance Center under the SIPO, first functioning as the Deputy Director General and then as the Director General. From December 2002 to July 2004, he served as the Secretary General of the Patent Office under the SIPO. In August 2004, he was officially appointed as the Deputy Commissioner of the SIPO.

Mr. HE Hua is quite proficient in the field of intellectual property.

Xin HU is a Senior Patent Manager at Intellectual Property Department of Tencent, with responsibility for managing patent litigation, developing licensing strategies, performing patent portfolio assessment and transaction. Prior to Tencent, he served as a Senior IP Counsel at ZTE Corporation and was responsible for managing patent litigations in multiple jurisdictions and patent licensing negotiations.

Cindy Huang is a lawyer qualified in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Cindy speaks native Mandarin, fluent English and Japanese.

Cindy is currently the Legal Counsel of Ferrero Asia Limited, a subsidiary of Ferrero, a prestigious international chocolate manufacturer. She is based in Hong Kong, taking charge of the group’s legal matters in Taiwan, Japan, Malaysia, Vietnam and Brunei.

Cindy obtained her master of laws degree (LL.M.) from the London School of Economics (LSE). Before joining Ferrero, she was a corporate lawyer working in a leading Taiwanese law firm in Taipei, and afterwards, in an international law firm in Shanghai. She advised on cross-border corporate legal matters in the Greater China Region. Cindy was also a part-time tutor in the Open University of Hong Kong, lecturing on the PRC laws.

Charmaine is the Co-Head of Deacons’ Intellectual Property Department and the Head of IP Litigation and Enforcement, Commercial IP and Entertainment and Media Practice Groups.

Charmaine obtained a B.Sc. degree in Biology from the University of Toronto, followed by a Bachelor of Law degree from Queen’s University. She then went on to obtain a Masters in Law from University of Cambridge and a Certificate in Intellectual Property Law and Practice from University of Bristol.

Charmaine advises on all aspects of commercial IP, including the structure and documentation of complex commercial transactions, licensing, franchising, distribution, cobranding as well as IT, technology, media, entertainment and advertising agreements. She also has extensive experience advising on copyright, data protection and personal data privacy. Charmaine represents many of the world’s leading brands, advertising agencies, entertainment businesses, ISPs and content providers in relation to a wide range of innovative IP or internet issues. Charmaine’s practice covers all aspects of IP work including anti-counterfeiting strategies and enforcement of IP rights. She advises on complex IP enforcement advice, litigation and arbitration. She has won a number of high profile court cases resulting in ground-breaking decisions in the Hong Kong IP field.

She has won many accolades including being selected as the finalist of the Dispute Resolution Lawyer of the Year by Asian Legal Business Hong Kong Law Awards (2017), ranked as World’s Top 250 Women in IP by Managing IP (2016 & 2017), Band 1 Leading IP Individual by Chambers and Tier 1 Leading IP Individual by Legal 500 (2016 & 2017). She is the President of Licensing Executives Society of China, Hong Kong Sub-Chapter in 2017.

• Advisor, Asia Innovation & IP Society
• Co-founder & Vice Chairman, Asia Pacific Cloud Apps Alliance
• Co-founder, Hong Kong Industry-University-Research Collaboration Alliance
• Founding President, CASPA (Chinese American Semiconductor, Professional Association), PRD Chapter
• Founding CIPO, NetLogic Microsystems Inc.

Mr. Kwok has been working in the semiconductor industry in Silicon Valley since 1979, with extensive trend-setting and start-up experiences (at IDT, Quality Semiconductor Inc., PMC-Flash and NetLogic Microsystems Inc. he was the founding team-member of the last 3 companies and underwent 3 IPO’s & 1 M&A), covering business developments, then cutting-edge technology developments and applications, IP portfolio developments and licensing, manufacturing operations, as well as product developments and product engineering.

He played a critical role in bringing 2 foundation-disruptive technologies mainstream (>90% global market share), laying the foundation for the Information Technology Era: CMOS addressing Hardware platform for Moore’s Law scalability at Integrated Device Technology Inc. as the “Yield Guru”; and Network Search Engine/Knowledge Based Processor addressing Network Real-time Interactive “QoS” platform for Metcalfe’s Law scalability at NetLogic Microsystems Inc. as its “Founding Chief IP Officer” and “Product Development Champion”.

His IP experiences covered in 1989 at Quality Semiconductor Inc. with tech transfers to Japanese strategic partners, then extended to technology licensing to top-tier companies at Programmable Microelectronics Corp. from 1996 to 1998. The highlight of his IP experiences was being the Founding CIPO at NetLogic Microsystems Inc. (NMI) to conceive and establish the IP portfolio development strategy and blueprint making NMI, though a SME, a dominating IP powerhouse in Silicon Valley (recognized by IEEE in 2006) - IPO in 2004 for US$250M and M&A in 2011 by BRCM for US$3.7B.

He returned to Hong Kong/PRD in 2002 and has been promoting application/modern service platform developments and Innovation/IP management in China. Mr. Kwok was the co-editor of “Handbook of Best Practices In Intellectual Property Management” in Chinese. He served on the HKSAR IP Working Group from 2013 to 2015.

He has a BSES and a MSEE from the University of Texas at Austin.

Mrs Carrie Lam joined the Administrative Service of the Hong Kong Government in August 1980 and rose to the rank of Administrative Officer Staff Grade A1 in September 2006. She became a Principal Official on July 1, 2007 when she was appointed Secretary for Development. She was appointed Chief Secretary for Administration on July 1, 2012.

Mrs Lam has served the public for more than 36 years in 20 public service positions including Director of Social Welfare, Permanent Secretary for Housing, Planning and Lands (Planning and Lands), Director-General of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in London, Permanent Secretary for Home Affairs, Secretary for Development and Chief Secretary for Administration.

Mrs Lam was elected as the Fifth-Term Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region on March 26, 2017, and was officially appointed to this position by the Central People’s Government on March 31, 2017 to assume office on July 1, 2017.

Mrs Lam is married and has two sons.

Dr. Kam Wah Law is a partner at Squire Patton Boggs. Squire Patton Boggs is a full-service global law firm with over 1,500 lawyers in 46 offices across 21 countries. It is one of the biggest law firms in the world.

Dr. Law is a US patent lawyer and Hong Kong solicitor advising a variety of clients including Fortune 500 clients on intellectual property matters. He assists clients in applying for and prosecuting trademark and patent applications worldwide in the fields of renewable energy, pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, chemicals, electronics, mechanics, printing and technology. He frequently engages in patent due diligence and provides patentability opinions, freedom-to-operate opinions, infringement or non-infringement opinions, invalidity or validity opinions, and license agreements. He also advises clients on enforcement of patent rights and other intellectual property matters in various jurisdictions.

Prior to his career in law he worked at Global 500 companies, such as 3M and Samsung Electronics, focusing on both research and development and intellectual property works. He received his US patent agent license in 1999, and his J.D. and US patent attorney license in 2003. As an inventor himself, Kam has obtained more than 300 patents worldwide.

Kam is a member of the American Bar Association, American Intellectual Property Law Association, Law Society of Hong Kong, Asian Patent Attorneys Association, Hong Kong Institute of Patent Practitioners, and Hong Kong Institute of Patent Attorneys.

Stella is a Member of Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS), Accredited Senior Appraiser of American Society of Appraisers (ASA) and Registered Business Valuers of the Hong Kong Business Valuation Forum (HKBVF). Stella is a Master of Science in Financial Analysis from the Hong Kong University of Science & Technology and Bachelor of Engineering (Hons) from the University of Hong Kong. Stella specializes in valuation of business and intangible assets with over 10 years experience in the industry and has been providing valuation services for a wide range of purposes, to name but a few, pre-IPO investment/ pre-deal analysis, due diligence during the negotiation process, as well as financial reporting purpose upon deal completion, which involves valuation of equity interest, intellectual properties and other intangibles, and etc. Stella is a frequent speaker in the industry and was invited to be speaker for various events such as BIP Asia, HKTDC SmartHK, luncheon organized by Intellectual Property Department, etc.

Principal and founder of Chloe Lee & Co; Chloe has been practising in the Intellectual Property area for over 20 years. She has extensive experience in a wide spectrum of IP-related work covering non-contentious, contentious, anti-counterfeiting, enforcement, merchandising advice, licensing and domain name dispute resolution in Hong Kong, China and other parts of the world.

Chloe was named as a Leading Individual in IP practice in The Asia Pacific Legal 500, from 2001 to 2005.

Chloe has also been ranked in IAM (Intellectual Asset Management) Licensing 250 2010 – The World’s Leading Patent and Technology Licensing Lawyers, and in “Leading LAWYER 100” 2011 Guide for IP Law section; and endorsed by the WTR 1000 – The World’s Leading Trademark Practitioners as a leading trademark expert in 2017.

Chloe became a China Appointed Attesting Officer since 2012 on appointment by the China Ministry of Justice.

Anita has been a legal practitioner for more than 25 years, advising both local and multinational companies on the full spectrum of both contentious and non-contentious intellectual property and information technology work, including mergers, acquisition and commercialization of IP assets, internal IP audits, pre-IPO due diligence, joint ventures, research collaboration, licensing, franchising and distribution. She provides clients with strategic brand integrity programs involving regional and cross-border enforcement of IP rights at all levels, litigating on copyright, trademark, design and patent disputes. Anita also assists clients on data privacy and cybersecurity issues, both locally and regionally, and the development and execution of diverse legal initiatives to manage the legal risks faced by companies in the Greater China and Asia Pacific region. Prior to joining David Lo and Partners as a consultant, Anita was a partner with two top international law firms in Hong Kong, Jones Day and Baker & McKenzie.

Anita sits on the BIP Asia Forum Steering Committee of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council and is the past Chairman of Licensing Executives Society China (Hong Kong Sub-Chapter) from 2013 to 2016. She is also a member of the Working Committee of the Intellectual Property Rights Protection Alliance, the Intellectual Property Committee of the Hong Kong Law Society and a Council Member of the Federation of Woman Lawyers.

Education:
• PhD of Pharmacy
• Economics Postdoctoral Fellow
• Visiting Scholar at University of Washington

Work Experience:
• has been selected in the National Intellectual Property Expert Database of the People’s Republic of China
• has long been committed to macro-management policy researches of intellectual property
• has been participating in the constituting process of national significant intellectual property policy in recent years
• act as organizer and implementer to carry out the pilot work of intellectual property operation service in marketization mode

Mr Stephen Liang is Assistant Executive Director of the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC), the statutory organisation responsible for promoting and developing the city’s external trade. He oversees the Council’s Chinese mainland and international activities that promote Hong Kong products and services.

Mr Liang joined the HKTDC in 1996 as Manager, Service Promotion. In 2000, he was posted to the Council’s Singapore office to oversee the Southeast Asian market. Mr Liang was promoted to Head of Mainland Promotions in 2005, managing the HKTDC’s promotional activities on the Chinese mainland. Before taking up his current post, he served as Director, Product Promotion.

Born and raised in Hong Kong, Mr Liang graduated from York University in Canada with a Bachelor of Sociology degree. He then furthered his studies on Business Administration at the University of California, Los Angeles in the US.

Mr Liang began his career with the Hong Kong Tourism Board (HKTB) and Hong Kong Industrial Technology Centre (now called the Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks Corporation). While at the HKTB, he served as its representative on the US West Coast for more than four years.

Andrew Liao is a Senior Counsel in Hong Kong specializing in intellectual property for over 40 years. Andrew was appointed Queen’s Counsel in 1989, and had been appointed Deputy High Court Judge in 1990, and Recorder of the High Court in 2000-2002.

For years, apart from his professional practice, Andrew has continuously and actively participated in public service in matters concerning intellectual property in Hong Kong. As a member of the Law Reform Commission and its Copyright Sub-Committee, he was actively and closely involved in the reform of the copyright law, leading to the enactment of the Copyright Ordinance in 1997. He was the first Chairman of the Copyright Tribunal, and Convenor of the Hong Kong Bar’s Task Force on Intellectual Property. In 2001, Andrew was awarded the Silver Bauhinia Star by the Government for his contribution to the reform of intellectual property laws. He was Vice-Chairman of the Working Group on Intellectual Property Trading which recommended the promotion of arbitration and evaluative mediation for resolving intellectual property disputes, and Chairman of the Steering Committee on Review of Intellectual Property Issues in the Innovation and Technology Sector. He is Chairman of the Advisory Committee on Review of the Patent System which recommendation of establishing Hong Kong’s own original grant patent system is in the process of being implemented by the Government. He is also Contributing Editor of the High Court Patent Rules under Order 103 of the Hong Kong Civil Procedure.
Andrew was formally a Non-Official Member of the Executive Council of the HKSAR. For his distinguished public service, he was awarded the Gold Bauhinia Star by the HKSAR Government in 2008.

Andrew has been actively promoting intellectual property, intellectual property trading, intellectual property arbitration and mediation, cultural and creative industries, innovation and technology in Hong Kong, and was the founder and organizer of the BIP Forum (Business of Intellectual Property Forum) as part of BODW (Business of Design Week) in Hong Kong from 2007 to 2011.

Richard is a partner at Lawjay Partners. He is qualified as a Patent Attorney of the PRC in 2006 and as an attorney at law of the PRC in 2007.

Richard focuses on patent infringement litigation, patent administrative litigation, invalidation procedure, re-examination procedure and trade secrets litigation. Richard has handled a large number of cases in the technical fields of chemistry, machinery and communication. Two of Richard's cases were enlisted by the Supreme Court of China as the Top 10 IP cases of 2010 and 2013, and four cases were enlisted by the SPC as the 50 exemplary cases.

Luo Li, Vice President of China Literature, is one of the founders of Qidian. He is also the operation expert of the copyright of internet literature, one of the initiators of the commercializations of China's internet literature and of the expansion of copyrights.

In addition, he is one of the first generation internet writers. He has served successively in publishing and copyright expansion for Qidian and Tencent. Then he leads his team to accomplish and create many famous IP such as ‘Fighter Of the Destiny（择天记）’，’Candle In the Tomb（鬼吹灯）’ ，’The King's Avater（全职高手）’, expanding their industrial chains in the field of publication, cyber games, animation, films and television.

Li Yao joined China Daily in 2010 as a reporter based at the Beijing headquarters. She relocated to Hong Kong in 2013 as a reporter and then editor for the Hong Kong edition’s award-winning Focus section. She is now News Editor of China Daily Hong Kong.

Ms. Li has become an agent of change, leading the team that pioneers and implements the digital transformation of China Daily Hong Kong. Through this continuing transformation, she helps guide the formerly print-oriented operations toward greater emphasis on the era of digital publishing. This new era employs new skills and standards, bringing China Daily Hong Kong new features, expanded content and new readers in a highly competitive market.

Ms. Li takes charge of China Daily Hong Kong’s coverage of critical issues, as part of the company’s commitments to serving the community through impactful journalism. Since 2015, she has led China Daily Hong Kong’s Data Journalism team that embraces data analysis and visualization, offering fresh insights to readers and encouraging meaningful action by stakeholders.

Ms. Li has covered extensive issues concerning the symbiosis between the Chinese mainland and Hong Kong. She holds a Master’s Degree from the School of International Relations and Public Affairs, Fudan University.

Mr. Hao MA was the Vice President of AIPPI from 2014 to 2016 and became the President in 2016.

Mr. Hao MA is the President of CCPIT Patent and Trademark Law Office. He joined CCPIT Patent and Trademark Law Office in 1992 after working in Beijing Research Institute of Automation for Machinery Industry from 1982 to 1992 as an electronics engineer.

Mr. Hao MA's practice focuses on patent prosecution, reexamination, invalidation and appeal, litigation and licensing. He has extensively counseled domestic and international clients on other IP issues such as copyright, technology import and export, and border enforcement.

Mr. Hao MA is also the Member of Advisory Committee of Experts on State IPR, Member of Expert Committee of Market Regulation of SAIC, Vice President of All-China Patent Attorneys Association, President of CTA Trademark Agent Branch Association, Vice President of LES China, Regional Ambassador for China of ICC Intellectual Property Commission and Arbitrator for China International Economic and Trade Arbitration Commission.

Rex is Co-Founder of iGen6 (http://iGen6.com) which is a Digi-Marcom innovator for online branding and smart communities. He oversees the group’s strategic roadmap and plans the overall business development. Established in 2010, iGen6 has helped to fulfill clients’ business growth and promotion needs through innovation management & digi-marcom best practices such as O2O branding platform services, digital PR & marketing as well as smart estate project development.

Rex has established a huge and solid social network as well as people connection. Currently, he serves the community in the following leading roles:
• Corporate Communication and PR Director, Hong Kong Computer Society Foundation
• Hon. Digital Advisor, Hong Kong Public Relations Professional Association
• Academic Advisor, The Cosmetic & Perfumery Association of Hong Kong
• Advisor, SME Consultative Committee, China Light and Power Co. Ltd.
• Vice President, Asia Pacific Creativity Industries Association
• Subcommittee member - Promotion, Corporate Volunteering, HKSAR Social Welfare Department
• Lead, Mobility & Web Technology Subcommittee and External Community Subcommittee, Cyberport Startup Alumni Association
• Industrial Fellow, Interdisciplinary Program Office, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology

Ma Zhongjun is the Chairman and President of Ciwen Media Co., Ltd. In September 2015, he led Ciwen Media to complete a major assets restructuring, and officially listed on the Chinese A-share market in the Shenzhen Stock Exchange in November. At present, Ciwen Media has developed into a large pan-entertainment media group composed of 13 sections covering film, television drama, animation, game, talent agent and other relevant businesses with the core "Internet plus" DNA. Ciwen Media spreads and shows stories and values of contemporary China through consistent and successful artworks.

With the advent of the Internet era, China's film and television field is facing a transition period. Ma Zhongjun with his unique market foresight and outstanding business courage led Ciwen Media to go through a successful transformation. "The Journey of Flower" in 2015 created a miracle rating and opened the market of weekly broadcast drama mode. "The Mystic Nine" is a high-quality net adventure drama which gained a large number of fans. The drama "Chu Qiao Biography" in 2017 once again created the highest clicks on Chinese networks ever, in the meantime became a hit in YOUTUBE, gained the United States Asian film festival Golden Oak Award for outstanding TV drama, and becomes the only finalist of Chinese film and television works in 2017 Cannes TV Festival Global The hottest TV drama award. Ciwen media continues to bring surprises to the audience at home and abroad.

Toshimoto Mitomo was named Corporate Executive of Sony Corporation responsible for Sony Corporation’s global mid-to-long term business development in addition to his responsibility as Corporate Executive responsible for Sony Corporation’s Intellectual Property. In these roles, Mr Mitomo is responsible for Sony’s global IP rights and its alliances and partnerships in the areas of new technologies and patents, strategizing Sony’s global Technology Standard Setting activities, and Sony’s global mid-to-long term business development for the future growth of Sony Corporation.

In addition, Mr Mitomo serves as the Senior Investment Executive for Sony Innovation Fund which is Sony Corporation’s corporate venture fund. He also holds the Executive Vice President position at Sony Corporation of America for both New Format Promotions and Corporate Technology America. He is also president of SCA IPLA Holdings, Inc. – SCA’s wholly owned subsidiary that focuses on IP-related M&A and investments – and has served on the boards of all joint ventures in which SCA IPLA Holdings, Inc. has invested.

As a part of his public services, Mr Mitomo serves as Vice Chairman of the Japan Intellectual Property Association (JIPA) – the biggest non-profit, non-government industry organization in Japan – which represents the IP industry and IP users and comprises 1,271 member companies. He is also a member of the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry Industrial Structure Council.

Mr Mitomo has taken a leading role in a number of IP-related deals, including the formation of MPEG LA, the joint acquisition of Nortel patents, the joint acquisition of InterTrust and the formation of a number of joint ventures with industry partners such as Philips, Ericsson, Nokia, Microsoft, Apple, RIM, the Discovery Channel and InterDigital Communications.

Academic Qualifications (in descending chronological order)

Date of Award: 25 August 2016
Degree: Postgraduate Certificate in English Studies for Language Teaching
Field of Study: Education
Awarding Institution: The Open University of Hong Kong

Date of Award: 30 May 2014
Degree: Certificate of Attendance in PRC Shipping Law
Field of Study: Law
Awarding Institution: The University of Hong Kong

Date of Award: 10 September 2013
Degree: Statement of Attendance of Programme Series in PRC Corporation Practices – Corporate Law in PRC
Field of Study: Law
Awarding Institution: The Hong Kong Institute of Chartered Secretaries and HKU School of Professional and Continuing Education

Date of Award: 13 June 2013
Degree: Master of Education in Liberal Studies Education
Field of Study: Education
Awarding Institution: The Open University of Hong Kong

Date of Award: February 2011
Degree: Certificate of Attendance of 40-Hour Advanced Mediation Course
Field of Study: Law
Awarding Institution: Hong Kong Mediation Centre

Date of Award: 30 November 2010
Degree: Master of Laws in Information Technology and Intellectual Property Law
Field of Study: Law
Awarding Institution: The University of Hong Kong

Professional Qualifications and Activities (in descending chronological order)
Date of Award: 18 April 1995
Area of
Profession: Solicitor of the Supreme Court (UK)
Awarding Institution: The Law Society (UK)

Date of Award: 4 June 1994
Area of Profession: Solicitor, HK
Awarding Institution: The Supreme Court of Hong Kong

Current appointment (in descending chronological order)
08/2011 - present Lecturer/Senior Lecturer (since 11/2015), B&A, OUHK

Research Areas
Intellectual Property Law, Financial Technology Law, Competition Law, Company Law

Mr Gabriel Pang is the Founder and the Managing Director of Firedog Creative Company Limited and has more than 17 years of experience in IT and Creative industries. Mr Pang founded the famous game company “Firedog Studio” in 1999, and he is one of the pioneers in Hong Kong game development.

Mr Pang’s major public services include the Chairman of Hong Kong Digital Entertainment Association since 2008, board member of Hong Kong Education City Limited, Vice Chairman of Hong Kong Software Industry Association, committee member of Commission on Youth, committee member of Hong Kong Taiwan Cultural Cooperation Committee, committee member of Exchanges with Taiwan Funding Scheme Assessment Committee, member of ITF Enterprise Support Scheme Assessment Panel and committee member of VTC Committee on IT Training and Development.

Bruce Ren (Chinese name 任健), is a graduate of Peking University with both B.S and M.S in Computer Science. He has more than 30 years of solid working experience in IT. He used to work in Lenovo, Microsoft, TCL, Kingsoft, in roles including CTO/COO/CFO. He was an Angel Investor and entrepreneur too. He funded a mobile phone company Bowo Tech while being the CEO himself. He has lived in the US for 8 years and in Germany for 1 year.

Andrew was appointed counsel in October 2016 and splits his time between Hong Kong and Beijing. Andrew has more than twenty-five years' experience in brand protection and litigation and has been responsible for developing anti-counterfeit programmes using investigations, intelligence analysis, engagement and criminal and civil litigation to achieve results. Andrew has particular experience in managing complex investigations and in working with law enforcement and prosecutors as well as in deploying commercial litigation strategies, such as the use of interlocutory injunctions against infringers.

Andrew coordinates the firm's anti-counterfeit practice in Asia and works closely with colleagues in China, Singapore and other offices worldwide. He brings an in-house perspective to brand protection strategies having worked at senior level in the brand protection team at Philip Morris International for fourteen years, including in Asia, Latin America and a number of years as the global Director Brand Integrity. Prior to his in-house role, Andrew was a litigation partner at a major international law firm in Hong Kong and worked extensively on brand protection matters across Asia.

Sam came from a humble family with supportive and encouraging parents and elder sibling. Being the youngest, Sam was given unlimited freedom to dream and innovate. The Says were refugees from Lao after the Vietnam war, resettled in western Canada late 1979.

After ten years as a half-baked commodity trader in HK, Sam was intrigued by the question - The farmers who put food on our tables remain the poorest on earth, why? The search for answers led Sam to his native Lao, where coffee growers are not making it as a sustainable and profitable small businesses. The bigger motivator was the fact many of the school aged girls were not attending school, lacking in resources, coffee growers opt out of sending their girls to school, rather keeping them at home to help care for younger sibling and help out in the fields. This impacted Sam in a personal way, Sam's mom, although a very smart and loving woman, did not get a day of school in her native China. These all work together to move Sam to start an organic coffee farm, eventually arrive at inventing and patenting of an improved earth-friend method to process high quality coffee in the cup with repeatable consistency.

As a social enterprise, Bolaven Farms remains focus on building and managing the entire supply chain for specialty coffee. The zero waste tree-to-cup model could offer an all-winning prospect for coffee growers, the environment and consumers.

Prof Simon See is currently the Solution Architecture and Engineering Director and Chief Solution Architect for Nvidia AI Technology Center. He is also a Professor and Chief Scientific Computing Officer in Shanghai Jiao Tong University. Previously Prof See is also the Chief Scientific Computing Advisor for BGI (China) and has an position in Nanyang Technological University (Singapore) and King-Mong Kung University of Technology (Thailand). Prof See is currently involved in a number of smart city projects especially in Singapore and China. His research interests are in the area of artificial intelligence, machine learning, computational science, applied mathematics and simulation methodology. Prof. See is also leading some of the AI initiatives in Asia Pacific. He has published over 200 papers in these areas and has won various awards.

Prof See is also member of SIAM, IEEE and IET. He also committee member of more than 50 conferences.

Prof See graduated from University of Salford (UK) with a Ph.D. in electrical engineering and numerical analysis in 1993. Prior to joining NVIDIA, Prof See worked for SGI, DSO National Lab of Singapore, IBM, International Simulation Ltd. (UK), Sun Microsystems and Oracle. He is also providing consultancy to a number of national research and supercomputing centers.

Haochen Sun is Associate Professor of Law and Director of Law and Technology Center at the University of Hong Kong Faculty of Law. His writings on intellectual property have been published by Cambridge University Press, Oxford University Press, and leading law journals. Haochen has advised law firms and companies in the entertainment, information technology, and luxury and fashion sectors on matters relating to intellectual property protection. His opinions about intellectual property have appeared in Forbes, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times, South China Morning Post, Ming Pao, Shenzhen Satellite TV, and RTHK.

He was born in 1962, graduated from Tokyo University (1985) and Graduate School for Foreign Service, Georgetown University (1993). After joining MITI (currently METI, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry) in 1985, he engaged in various tasks including policy planning and trade negotiation, especially on intellectual property, innovation, IT, as FTA negotiator(2001-2004), Director for IPR Policy Office(2004-2005), Director for innovation Promotion(2006-2007), Director for IT industry(2007-2009), Executive Director for JMC Brussels office(2009-2013), DG for Fuel and Resources(2013-2015), DG for Commerce, Distribution and Industrial Safety(2015-2017).

He also served as the chairman of World Intellectual Capital/Assets Initiative (WICI) from 2009 to 2013.

After taking his current position in July 2017, he has been responsible for nation-wide IP strategy, including various contents and national branding.

David is a Senior Associate in Deacons’ Intellectual Property practice, and is qualified as a solicitor in both Hong Kong and England & Wales. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Biochemistry from Imperial College, a Master of Science degree in Entrepreneurship, Science & Technology from the University of Nottingham, England and an LLB from The College of Law, London, England. He also holds a Postgraduate diploma in Intellectual Property Law and Practice from Oxford University. His practice involves working with clients on a range of non-contentious IP issues. His main focus is advising clients in relation to commercial IP matters including complex licensing, assignment, service, and distribution agreements, and the IP aspects of corporate transactions (including IP due diligence). David is also experienced in general commercial IP matters such as software, e-commerce, and personal data (including general privacy matters, privacy policy documents and terms of business), as well as entertainment law.

He is the co-author of the Hong Kong chapter of LexMundi’s Data Privacy Guide (2016), and the co-author of the Hong Kong Chapter of “Data Protection & Privacy – International Series (Third Edition)” published by Thomson Reuters (2016). David is also a Council Member and the Legal Committee Chair of the Licensing Executives Society (LES) of Hong Kong (2017), and also the Chair of the Organising Committee for LES’ Pan-Asian Young Members Congress in Hong Kong (2018).

Prof. Tam has spent 30 years teaching and research in biochemistry and molecular biology in Hong Kong and USA. He was the Co‐founder, Secretary, President of the Hong Kong Biochemistry Association. During his tenure in the University of Hong Kong, he brought in the cutting‐edge rDNA technology and trained many regional scientists in 1983 by organizing the 1st International rDNA Training Course. His laboratory has cloned the globin, G6PD and Insulin receptor genes; uncovered mutations responsible for genetic diseases.

After retirement, Prof. Tam stayed in Hong Kong and co‐founded 3 biotechnology companies, providing the platform for young scientists to continue work in the field. Prof. Tam had been Visiting Professor at UCSF, Baylor Medical College and Augusta College of Medicine and Visiting Scientist of NIH and R&D Director, EY Laboratories Inc.

He is the inventor of over 10 international patents and the Flow‐through Hybridization technology has become the core technology for many companies in Europe and greater China, including DiagCor Bioscience Ltd.

Name : Dr. Molan Tarigan

Formal Education : Doctoral Degree

Institution : Directorate General of Intellectual Property, Ministry of Law and Human Rights of the Republic of Indonesia

Title : Director of Cooperation and IP Empowerment

Pendidikan:

- Doctoral Degree Of Philosophy In Management, 2007;

- Master Degree of Economic Law, 2000, Jakarta;

- Bachelor Degree of Civil Law, 1983, Yogyakarta.

Admitted to the High Court of Hong Kong in 1990, Anthony Tong is the managing partner of Robin Bridge & John Liu who also heads its IP Department. He is also the managing director of the firm’s wholly owned IP Agency in Beijing.

Anthony has a substantial litigation practice in different areas of intellectual property in Hong Kong and China who also manages worldwide trade mark and patent portfolios. He also oversees numerous trade mark, copyright and patent litigations in China, US, Europe and Australia. He is also heavily involved in the R&D process of his clients advising on the various types of IP protection needed.

Anthony is named an IP Star by Managing IP continuously since. He has also been ranked in the Gold Tier of the World Trademark Review 1000 in 2017.

Anthony has been appointed as the Deputy Chairman of the Copyright Tribunal of the Hong Kong Government since 1st December 2011. He has also been appointed as a member of the Certifying Body of Hong Kong-Canada Film and Television Co-production established between the Hong Kong Government and the Canadian Government as well as a member of the Appeal Panel (Housing) under the Transport and Housing Bureau of the Hong Kong Government.

Anthony is also the Honorary Legal Adviser of the Design Council of Hong Kong, under the auspices of the Federation of Hong Kong Industries. He is a Notary Public and a PRC Appointed Attesting Officer.

Anthony has spoken extensively on IP related topics in Hong Kong, China and internationally.

Annie joined the Association in 2000 and became the Assistant Secretary General in 2016.

Annie has been a Partner at Deacons since 2001. She is currently the Co-Head of the IP Department and Head of China IP Practice Group of the firm, managing the IP team in Hong Kong, Beijing and Shanghai offices.

Annie advises all aspects of intellectual property work and in particular, on the unique challenges arising from doing business in China. Annie has advised many major Hong Kong and multi-national companies on strategic issues relating to the protection, enforcement and commercial exploitation of IPRs including managing complex intellectual property portfolios and she represents some of the world’s leading companies in the luxury goods, cosmetic, pharmaceutical, entertainment, fashion and electronics industries.

Annie has advised extensively on the IP aspects of acquisition and restructuring of businesses including technology transfer, licensing and cooperation issues, technology development and improvement. Annie also specialises in Internet-related regulations and domain name disputes.

Annie has written numerous articles for publications such as The Journal of World Intellectual Property and China Law and Practice. She has spoken for international conferences such as universities, Inter-Pacific Bar Association and International Trademark Association. She has been a part time lecturer for the Faculty of Law, University of Hong Kong.

Annie has been acknowledged as a Leading Lawyer in the area of Intellectual Property in the Chambers Global - The World’s Leading Lawyers, a Leading Individual in the area of Intellectual Property in Hong Kong by the Chambers Asia and a leading lawyer in the area of Trade Marks in the Who’s Who Legal - The International Who’s Who of Trademark Lawyers.

Since joining Louis Vuitton’s Global Intellectual Property Department in 2009 Mayank has been responsible for Louis Vuitton and Fashion Division’s intellectual property matters in Asia Pacific. Before joining the LVMH Group, he worked at Daimler AG for 8 years in various positions in Germany, India and PRC.

Between 2012 and 2015 he chaired the European Brands Protection Council under the European Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong. While in China and India he was an active member of cross-industry intellectual property lobbying groups including Quality Brands Protection Committee (QBPC), Task force on Anti-Counterfeiting of Society of Indian Automotive Manufacturers and High Level National Committee on IPR India. He co-chaired the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) Alliance for Anti-Counterfeiting & Piracy in 2004.

Certified Patent Valuation Analyst. EMBA from Richard Ivey School of Business, University of Western Ontario and Certificate Course on Intellectual Capital Management Consultancy by the IP Department, HKSAR. Law Graduate University of Delhi and Diploma in Intellectual Property and International Trade Laws, Delhi. Advocate (India) and practising Solicitor (Hong Kong).

Ms. Wang Binying, a national of China, joined the International Bureau of WIPO in April 1992, was appointed in December 2009 to the position of Deputy Director General responsible for the Brands and Designs Sector and was reappointed for a second mandate in December 2014.

The Sector has responsibility for international law development in the framework of the WIPO Standing Committee on the Law of Trademarks, Industrial Designs and Geographical Indications (SCT). The Sector is also responsible for the administration of the International Registration Systems for trademarks (Madrid Agreement and Protocol), industrial designs (Hague Agreement) and appellations of origin (Lisbon Agreement).

Ms. Wang’s academic background is in English language, communication, transportation and law. She graduated from the Zhongnan University in Changsha in China in the 1970s, and holds a Master’s degree in Law, including industrial property, from the Law School of University of California (Berkeley) in the USA. She was also awarded a Diploma in American Law from the Columbia Law School in New York.

Prior to joining WIPO, Ms. Wang worked in the Ministry of Communication and Transportation of China from 1975 to 1980, during which time she was stationed in the Republic of Tanzania and Zambia. She later served in State General Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC), and was in charge of the Department for Registration and Supervision of Foreign Company and Trade-names, and China Trademark Service, an institution concerned with trademark service under the SAIC until 1992.

Examiner, PCT Operations Division, Patents and Technology Sector, WIPO Xin WANG, a national of China, joined the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) in 2009. He is currently Examiner of PCT Operations Division, Patents and Technology Sector where he has the responsibility for the examination of PCT applications, communication with PCT users and authorities, training activities and workflow improvements. Prior to joining WIPO, Xin worked for Nokia Siemen Networks and Beijing Jingtie Investment Management Center. Xin graduated from the Beijing University of Technology with a Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical Engineering.

Mr. Willimott is an intellectual property expert, having worked for the World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) and the Australian IP Office for a combined total of 17 years. His main area of expertise lies in the IP communications field where he has led a number of large projects in Australia and in the Asia Pacific region.

At WIPO he works closely with governments and businesses throughout the region in order to increase awareness, understanding and strategic use of WIPO’s global IP systems such as the PCT, Madrid and Hague. He is a regular presenter at events and workshops in the region on all facets of the international IP system.

Before joining WIPO, he worked as the Director of IP Australia’s Marketing & Customer Engagement Section. In this position he was responsible for the development and implementation of a range of resources designed to raise awareness of IP issues amongst the business and general community in Australia. Mr Willimott has also worked for one of the largest law firms in Australia, as well as a host of other Australian Government organizations.

He holds a Master of Science in Management from University College Dublin at the National University of Ireland.

Amy Wong, Bachelor’s holder of Laws of Sun Yat-Sen University, Macao University and Master’s holder of Laws of China University of Political Science and Law. She takes the title of President of the Macao Victory Group, Chairwoman of the Macao Trademark Association, Chairwoman of Macao Intelligent Property Research Council, vice chairwoman of Legal Service Alliance of Chinese Mainland - Macao - Portuguese-speaking Countries, Secretary General of Macao Belt and Road Initiative Legal Service Alliance, Director of Federation of Chinese and Portuguese Entrepreneurs, member of Hong Kong, Macao , Taiwan and Foreign Affairs Committee of Guangdong Lawyers Association, Secretary General of Committee for Intellectual Property Rights of Zhuhai Lawyers Association

In 2004, by taking advantage of CEPA policy (arrangement of establishing closer economy and transaction relationship between mainland China and Macao) , Amy Wong started her career as a lawyer and obtained the lawyer license issued by Guangdong Justice Department, which made her the first Macao citizen holding a lawyer license in Mainland China and was honored as “the first person of Macao CEPA” by media.

Familiar with the different legal systems of Mainland China and Macao, Amy Wong soon became a rare link talent to make important contributions to the legal systems in both areas and explored the dramatic business opportunities and turned to be a pioneer for the cross-border legal services,especially in Intellectual Property field.

Amy Wong is also one of the Chinese lawyers providing legal services concerning the Portuguese-speaking countries.

K.F. Wong obtained his PhD from Edinburgh University, Scotland, in 1987. After his PhD, he was a researcher in Heriot-Watt University (Scotland), UniSys (Scotland) and ECRC (Germany). At present he is Associate Dean (External Affairs) of the Faculty of Engineering, Professor in the Department of Systems Engineering and Engineering Management, Director, Centre for Innovation and Technology, and Associate Director, Centre for Entrepreneurship, The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK). He is also Director, Key Laboratory on High Confidence Software Technologies (Sub-Lab, CUHK), Ministry of Education, Honorary Professor, Harbin Institute of Technology, Shenzhen and Adjunct Professor, School of Computer Technology, Peking University.

His research interest focuses on Chinese natural language processing and database. He has published over 260 technical papers in these areas in different international journals, conferences and books. He is a senior member of IEEE, fellows of BCS (UK), IEE (UK) and HKIE. He is the founding Editor-In-Chief of ACM Transactions on Asian Language Processing (TALIP), and International Journal on Computational Linguistics and Chinese Language Processing.

K.F. is very active in professional activities in Hong Kong. He serves as the Chairman, ICT Advisory Committee, HK Scout Association; Member of the Consumer Council; Non-official Member, Airport Technology Advisory Council of the Hong Kong International Airport; Member of Radio Television Hong Kong Board of Advisors; and Member of The Hong Kong Society for the Aged Advisory Committee on ICT Development.

He was awarded the Medal of Honour (MH) by the HKSAR Government in 2011 for his contribution in IT development in Hong Kong.

Kenny K S Wong has practised for close to 30 years and received over 100 awards as a leading IP practitioner in Hong Kong and China. He also practises franchise law advising clients on setting up franchised operations in Hong Kong and the PRC, and has a niche entertainment practice acting for A-list artistes, film directors, film production companies and record companies.

Besides his busy practice, Kenny is also a seasoned lecturer and has delivered more than a 120 lectures, seminars and presentations to lawyers, enterprises, universities and members of the public on IP and IT subjects in Hong Kong, China, Singapore, Malaysia, Japan, the Philippines and the United States. He is also an Adjunct Associate Professor of the University of Hong Kong and has taught courses on Cybercrime and Intellectual Property.

Kenny publishes extensively too. He co-authored Intellectual Property Law and Practice in Hong Kong, a recommended text by the three universities in Hong Kong which offer IP courses. He is also the co-author of the IP chapters in the tort reference book - Tort Law & Practice in Hong Kong.

Kenny serves on various professional committees, including the IP Committee of the Law Society of Hong Kong, and comments on the IP laws and practice of Hong Kong. He is an honorary legal adviser of Wai Yin Association - a charitable organisation set up by Miss Hong Kongs, and an executive committee member of First Initiative Foundation - a charity which supports and promotes the arts, music and designs of Hong Kong. He is the Chairman of the Appeal Panel of the Urban Renewal Authority and a member of the appeal panels of the Town Planning Board and the Home Purchase Allowance Appeals Committee. He is recently appointed the Deputy Chairman of the Copyright Tribunal

Pindar Wong is an internet pioneer, who co-founded the first licensed internet service provider in Hong Kong. He is also Founder and Chief Architect of the Belt and Road Blockchain Consortium that provides blockchain governance for the BNS - a corporate name and trademark to Blockchain Public Key Identifier Mapping Service and Blockmark Dispute Resolution Service for the digitisation of trade along China’s Belt and Road Initiative

In 2015, Pindar helped organise Asia's first Blockchainworkshops.org, ScalingBitcoin.org (I, II, III) and sponsored the Hong Kong Bitcoin Roundtable. In 2016, he established a global blockchain research network the bsafe.network to promote applied academic research in blockchain technologies and serves on the faculty of the Blockchain Research Institute. Pindar is also the chairman of the Internet Society's Blockchain Special Interest Group.

Pindar serves on the Hong Kong Government's Committee on Innovation, Technology and Re-industrialisation , as a Director of the Hong Kong Applied Science and Technology Research Institute (ASTRI) and he also serves on the Hong Kong Trade Development Council ICT Services Advisory Committee and the HKUST School of Engineering Advisory Committee. Previously, he was the first Vice-Chairman of ICANN, Chairman of the Asia Pacific Internet Association, alternate Chairman of Asia Pacific Network Information Center, Chairman of APRICOT, Commissioner on the Global Commission on Internet Governance and elected Trustee of the Internet Society.

Mr Yau assumed the post of the Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development on July 1, 2017. His portfolio covers policy areas from trade, commerce to telecommunications and broadcasting, and from promotion of creative industries, intellectual property and consumer protection to boosting inward investment and tourism development.

Mr Yau has his full career in the public service. Before taking up the current post, Mr Yau was the Director of the Chief Executive's Office from 2012 to 2017, assisting the Chief Executive in formulating policies and setting policy goals and priorities. He was the Secretary for the Environment from 2007 to 2012, overseeing policies on environmental protection, energy, nature conservation and sustainable development.

Mr Yau started his civil service career as an Administrative Officer in 1981. During his long service as a civil servant, he held various positions, including Director of Information Services, Deputy Secretary for Education and Manpower, Deputy Director-General of Trade and Industry as well as Director-General of the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in Washington, DC, USA.

Mr Yau graduated from the University of Hong Kong. He received further education at Oxford University and at Harvard University.

Aldrin Yim is the founding CEO of Codex Genetics Limited (Codex). Codex aims to provide personalized medicine services in Asia for patients with cancer or neurological disorders. In collaboration with Prince of Wales Hospital, Codex has developed a novel screening technology and helped diagnose over 100 patients with confounding neuro-related symptoms and rare diseases in 2016. The R&D of Codex is supported by HKSAR Innovation and Technology Commission, Hong Kong Science Park, and the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Aldrin received both his BSc and MPhil degrees from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, and is pursuing pre-doctoral training at the Washington University School of Medicine. His research primarily focuses on big data analytics and bioinformatics, which led to multiple discoveries including a novel major allergen class (designated as Group 24th Major allergen by WHO/IUIS Allergen Nomenclature subcommittee) through multi-omic approach analysis of dust mite (JACI 2015), as well as the identification of salt-tolerance gene in soybean through large scale genomic analysis (Nat. Comm. 2014).

Aldrin is now actively engaging in neuro-related research, such as disentangling the mechanisms of neuropathy using single-cell technology, as well as deciphering the gender dimorphism in brain cancer (JCI Insight 2017, J. Radiology 2017).

Mr Rimsky Yuen, SC, was appointed Secretary for Justice on July 1, 2012. He was a barrister in private practice before joining the Government, specialising in commercial disputes. He also served as arbitrator in international arbitration and mediator in commercial disputes.

Mr Yuen was appointed Senior Counsel in 2003 and a Recorder of the Court of First Instance of the High Court in 2006.

Mr Yuen has also served in various public duties, including as Member of the Judicial Officers Recommendation Commission (which Mr Yuen continues to serve in his current capacity as Secretary for Justice), Non-Official Member of the Independent Commission Against Corruption Advisory Committee on Corruption, Chairman of the Transport Advisory Committee, Non-executive Director of Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority and Council Member of the Hong Kong Institute of Education.

Dr. ZHANG Zhicheng holds a degree of Doctor of Laws of Peking University, and now he is the Director General of Protection and Coordination Department of the State Intellectual Property Office (SIPO). Since 1995, he has worked in China Patent Office, continuously as Deputy Director General of Intellectual Property (IP) Research Center, Deputy Director General of Protection and Coordination Department of SIPO.

He once took part in the work of formulating the National IP Strategy of China and working out relevant policy documents for speeding up the development of IP Power, and he was part of team that developed the National IP Strategy of China. He published the Research of IP Strategy, the Case Study of Patent Lawsuits in China and many essays in field of IP. He has been named one of IP Research leaders in China, the famous expert in the pool of skilled IP professionals in China. He is Ph. D. candidate supervisor in the law major.

Mr. Zhou Li is now the member of Editorial Board, the top decision-making body at China Daily Group, which is the largest national English-language news media in China. He is now the publisher and editor-in-chief of China Daily Asia Pacific, which manages operations in about 20 countries and regions including East Asia, Southeast Asia, Australia, the Middle East and Hong Kong. He is also now the Chairman of China Daily (Holding) Co. Ltd., China Daily Asia Pacific Ltd., China Daily Africa Ltd., China Daily USA Ltd., China Daily UK Ltd. and China Daily Hong Kong Ltd..

Mr. Zhou joined China Daily in 1990, after graduation with Master of Law from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences.

From 1990 to 2015, he has been consecutively serving on editorial, business and management posts at the China Daily Group, starting from copy editor, assistant director, executive director to deputy managing director. He was also the publisher and editor-in-chief for Shanghai Star between 2006 and 2008.

Mr. Zhou is now the member of the Newspaper Society of Hong Kong, and the member of board at the Hong Kong Federation of Journalists. He is also the Chief Representative to Asia News Network(ANN), an alliance of 24 major media in 20 countries in Asia. He initiated China Daily CEO Roundtable and Asia Leadership Roundtable, which are by-invitation networks of government officials, CEOs and senior executives of Fortune 500 companies in Asia and China.

Rick Zou, Executive Vice-President of National Eastern Tech-Transfer Center (NETC), is in charge of global strategy, brand and public affairs. He is devoted to promote the international communication and cooperation as well as regional economic linkage, and to implement the national strategic deployment “the Belt and Road Initiative”. He has served as the National Director of Youth Entrepreneur Project of Chinese Communist Youth League (CCYL) for more than ten years. He also promoted the establishment of Chinese Youth Entrepreneurship Ecosystem and international communication. He is the Chinese Sherpa of G20 Young Entrepreneurs' Alliance, the first China National Curator of the World Economic Forum Global Shapers Community and the Global Advisor of Microsoft.