China Daily's September GBA Focus featured a full-page interview with LaSense's Founder and CEO, Dr. Xu Ke. In the interview, the reporter discusses with Dr. Xu Ke the trend of the Hong Kong government's strong development of innovation and technology, the consequent increase in entrepreneurial activities and capital attention, as well as the entrepreneurs' perspective on the financing environment.

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▲China Daily published a full-page interview titled Startups rise on capital ideas on September 13th

In the interview, Dr. Xu Ke shared the different challenges and breakthroughs faced by LaSense before and after the epidemic. Xu Ke mentioned, “For tech startups, successfully securing an angel round of funding is an important milestone, making the step of transforming university innovations into the smallest executable product possible, and turning what was originally stuck in academic circles and widely recognized by researchers into a new key to solving the industry's pain point problems.” Hong Kong technology startups before and after the epidemic, faced with the complex and changing market demand, and the growing enthusiasm for angel investment in Mainland China and Hong Kong, must step out of their original financing comfort zone to design a more reasonable equity structure and look for more flexible fund-raising opportunities.

Innovation and technology are the hottest topics for the HKSAR government now and are also key to Hong Kong's positive transformation in the post epidemic era. In the two Policy Addresses of the Chief Executive of the HKSAR, Mr. Li Jiachao, the promotion of innovation and technology is a priority in fostering the development of Hong Kong society. The Hong Kong government is trying to create new opportunities beyond the traditional areas of trade and finance. It has taken a leading role in expanding the venture capital pool by launching more investment programs aimed at supporting technology start-ups.

The Innovation and Technology Commission (ITC) currently has three funding programs for startups, launched in 2014, 2017, and 2023, and among the many assistance programs, the Research-Academia-Institute-Institute-Science+ (RAISe+) program is the most talked about, with many startups seeing it as a platform for their next round of fundraising, with a cap of up to HK$100 million, and the funding delivery mechanism has shifted from direct grants to matching investments with Venture Capital firms to match investments in partnership. LaSense is also paying close attention to the latest progress of the RAISe+ program. For the development of innovation and technology in Hong Kong, the transformation of scientific research results of universities is a necessary and even mainstream path for Hong Kong, and the matching program between the government's financial support and professional investment institutions will help to more efficiently explore potential Unicorn projects with real market potential. The development process of these RAISe+ projects will not only help Hong Kong's top research universities to find outlets for their innovations, but also enable the Hong Kong government to lead the Hong Kong society towards Smart City and Re-Industrialization and reap the benefits.

In the interview, Dr. Xu Ke also expressed his positive views on the current venture capital market in Hong Kong. He believes that with the significant downturn of the venture capital market in Mainland China in the past two years, more domestic and foreign investors have turned their attention to Hong Kong, providing new opportunities for local technology start-ups, especially “science entrepreneurs” from universities. “This year, the attention of Hong Kong's science and technology enterprises has been significantly raised, and Hong Kong enterprises are no longer confined to the Internet, financial technology and other closely integrated with the local industry track, began to look for the explosive force from the results of university research, and gradually began to explore the mainland China and overseas markets. The HKSAR Government's series of innovation and technology policies have provided startups like LaSense Technology with a wider range of financing channels and development platforms, and this will accelerate our generation of entrepreneurs from academia to commercialization.”

Since launching its startup program in 2019, LaSense Technology has gradually grown into a leading company in laser spectroscopy industry applications with its innovative technology from the Chinese University of Hong Kong and flexible market response strategy. LaSense has completed three rounds of financing, and with the launch of the new round of financing plan, LaSense Technology will be more confident to apply advanced laser spectroscopy technology in energy digitization, cutting-edge scientific experiments, low-altitude economy, urban security, and smart agriculture.