Terry Wong Ping-sau, the CEO of Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks (HKSTP), radiated nostalgia as he scrolled through a map on his phone, focusing on the place he called home for three years while working on the Neom project, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia’s massive smart-city development.
“Look at this place,” he said. “This is Aqaba. I lived right there, on the shores of the Red Sea, at a crossroads of nations – bordered by Israel, Jordan and Saudi Arabia. The geography alone was incredible.”
But for Wong, the real magic was not the stunning sea views. It was the people and the experience of connecting diverse stakeholders into an ecosystem – not unlike his job at HKSTP, which he has held for three months.
“It was like a mini-United Nations,” he said of the Neom project, which aimed to develop a sustainable city powered 100 per cent by renewable energy. “Over 100 brilliant minds from every sector you can imagine. You’d sit down for a meal in the canteen, and right next to you would be someone from Europe, an expert from the US or a specialist from Asia.”
This daily, global collaboration became his greatest classroom. The three years he spent at Neom not only shaped his career but also broadened his horizons. At HKSTP, Wong draws on these experiences to map out the next phase of the park’s development.
“For over 20 years, the science park has established a very solid foundation, with our tech companies achieving outstanding performance across a number of areas,” he said. “In the future, we hope to achieve even more remarkable results, thereby elevating our status in Asia and the world.”
