Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
decades. Global FDI inflows rose substantially in
2005, up 29% from 2004, as Hong Kong main-
tained is number two position (behind China) as
East Asia's leading regional FDI target.
Hong Kong's culture is characterized by in-
dustriousness, and by individuals who desire to
better themselves (MAIT, 2005). As was men-
tioned in Korea's case below, such characteristics
may promote the adoption and acceptance of new
technologies, as these are seen as methods for
increasing efficiency, tools for learning, and as
an opportunity to show that one owns and knows
how to use the latest device.
A great proportion of Hong Kong's population
has realized the benefits of the government's pro-
technology efforts. Broadband is now available
to over 95 percent of households and to more
than 98 percent of business buildings. The PC
penetration rates in 2006 stood at 71 percent for
households and 88 percent for businesses, while
internet penetration rates held at 65 percent for
households and 83 percent for businesses (CEPAL,
2008). The mobile penetration rate of 123 percent
was mentioned above, while 70 percent of Internet
users have used e-government services.
Despite this level of technological progress,
the government still acknowledges that it must
go further in order to bridge the digital divide
within its borders. In order to ensure that the entire
community will benefit from IT development, the
government has begun collaborating with both
industry and NGOs in order to introduce a wide
range of measures to further enhance residents'
quality of life.
The “IT Honk Kong” campaign was designed
as a result, to promote IT adoption in the greater
community. It consists of free courses providing
IT training, free talks in libraries, district pro-
motional activities and infotainment programs
for citizens. Other initiatives include providing
public computers with Internet access at conve-
nient locations, computer recycling for the needy,
financial assistance to people with disabilities for
the purchase of computer facilities to enable work-
ing from home, and the installation of devices in
public computers so that they may be accessed
by the blind and visually impaired (Commerce,
Industry and Technology Bureau, 2004).
Singapore
The government of Singapore has been particularly
aggressive in promoting the deployment of new
technologies and broadband access, as manifested
in several initiatives, which are discussed below.
Given Singapore's lack of natural resources, its
government has pursued an international-oriented
business focus for a number of years. One result of
this plan is that the total production of U.S. MNC
affiliates constituted some 13% of Singapore's
Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Altogether, there
over 7,000 MNCs located in Singapore (Lim,
2006).
The Singapore government has been most
aggressive in promoting the deployment of new
technologies and broadband access, as manifested
in several initiatives. Relatively high labor costs
in Singapore, as shown in Figure 3, coupled with
high employee turnover rates, particularly in the
IT sector, a manpower shortage and a high overall
cost of doing business in Singapore is motivating
the government, in this respect, as some have
observed, to eventually encourage firms to adopt
teleworking (Lim and Teo, 2000).
One of the first two Singapore government
initiatives was the deployment of TradeNet, and
the Singapore ONE program. TradeNet, which
facilitates trade documentation online, processes
99% of all trade permit declarations, and is used
by over 2,400 companies. This service has reduced
processing time from several days to five minutes.
TradeNet Plus, a more complete and efficient
version that incorporates other online features,
such as payment and insurance, is expected to
further reduce processing time to between one
and three minutes. Furthermore, it is estimated
that it will generate annual savings of some S$2.8
billion (Shih, 1999, p.2).
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