Deep-Tech Lab

Building massively scalable,

science- and technology-based business ventures

at their seed stage

About Deep-Tech Lab

Deep-Tech Lab (DTL) is an incubation platform that aims to enhance the commercialization of science in order to make an impact on business and society. DTL has collaborated with the business school to offer a special course in which students learn to facilitate the ventures. DTL will establish a non-profit organisation to support its ongoing and future initiative.

Testimonial

Kodifly Limited

"Deep Tech Lab's accelerator has catalyzed Kodifly's progress with its rigorous mentorship and invaluable networks, pushing us through tough questioning, especially from our mentor Mike Mastroyiannis, to deeply understand our unique position in the market."

DTL Updates

Business Executive Program

Scientists Track

📅 Training Dates: July 5, 12, 19, 2025

🤝 Synergy Day: August 23, 2025 – Team Building & Matching

The Deep-Tech Lab (DTL) Business Executives Program – Scientists Track officially kicked off in July with an intensive series of sessions tailored for scientists and researchers aiming to commercialize their innovations.

In Session 1, participants were introduced to the fundamentals of deep-tech venture building, including commercialization strategy, leadership development, and startup team formation. The following online sessions delved deeper into problem-solution fit, stakeholder mapping, and financing strategies. Participants engaged in interactive exercises to understand cap tables, startup valuations, and investor expectations, guided by expert facilitators Olivier Cotard, Professor Kevin Au, Marta Dowejko, and Dr. Victoria Wang.

A highlight of the series was a founder sharing session by entrepreneur Ken Chau, who provided a candid and inspiring account of his fundraising journey and the strategic decisions involved in building a scalable venture.

This strong start sets the tone for the upcoming Synergy Day, where the scientists will meet with business professionals for cross-disciplinary collaboration and team matching. The DTL team looks forward to facilitating the next phase of deep-tech commercialization through this unique and impactful program.

Business Executive Program

Business Leaders Track

📅 Training Dates: August 2, 9, 16, 2025
🤝 Synergy Day: August 23, 2025 – Team Building & Matching

The Deep-Tech Lab (DTL) Business Executives Program officially commenced with its first session held at Hong Kong Baptist University. Despite a severe rainstorm in Hong Kong, many participants attended in person, while others joined remotely via a specially arranged hybrid format. We are grateful to all participants for their commitment and active engagement.

Throughout the day, a highly accomplished group of professionals brought forth sharp, distinctive perspectives — addressing key issues from commercialization barriers to scaling strategies. Their thoughtful contributions underscored their readiness to step into CXO roles and lead deep-tech ventures to the next level.

We were honoured to welcome Alice Reimer, who joined us live from Canada, sharing valuable global perspectives from her experience at Creative Destruction Lab (CDL). Her session generated in-depth discussion on how deep-tech ventures are shaped at the intersection of scientific innovation and market dynamics.

Our sincere thanks go to facilitators Dr. Victoria Wang and Professor Kevin Au, as well as guest speakers Sidney K.T. Tam and Danny Chen, for leading a thought-provoking and practical day of learning.

This marks only the beginning of the program, and we look forward to the continued development of these future deep-tech leaders in the weeks to come.

Background

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Hong Kong was born entrepreneurial. After a period of dormancy in the 1990s and 2000s, this spirit has once again risen in recent years, reversing the negative trend caused by short-term thinking, a backward mentality, oligopoly, and obsolete institutions.

Now with more inventions, training, and accelerator programs, a new breed of talents, a rapidly growing hinterland, and opportunities in the region, new tech ventures have spouted inside while an equal number of them, if not more, are attracted to set up in Hong Kong. Innovation-driven economy has taken off.

Riding on this trend, deep-tech startups, that provide technology solutions based on substantial scientific or engineering challenges and valuable intellectual property, have drawn interest from investors and policy-makers. See successful deep-tech ventures originated in Hong Kong.

While Hong Kong has many startup awards and incubation programs, few of them focus on deep-tech ventures. It is high time for Hong Kong to explore new ways to spot more of them and facilitate their success.

Services

Completely free of charge for ventures
Take your business to the next level!

Team-based, Objective-oriented Mentorship

Every admitted venture has access to practical and measurable guidance from investors, business leaders, industry experts, technical mentors, and business partners. Unlike other programs, the DTL program takes an objective-based approach. Usually 3 or more mentors will work as a team to nurture the admitted ventures.

An International Networking of Exchange

Mentors of DTL are picked with a nurturing mindset instead of deal-focused. We look for those who served Creative Destruction Lab and those around this region. Networking events, both online and offline, will be held to build a bridge between entrepreneurs and both incubators and investors.

Investment and Go-To-Market Opportunities

We will seek a wide range of investors and sponsors from local and overseas to participate in the DTL program. Investment opportunities will be provided across the whole DTL program. Corporates and consulting firms will supply the platform for product- testing and go-to-market experiments.

Services

Debated, Peer-reviewed Advice

Rather than a mentor dictating a direction for the venture in a one-on-one mentoring design, the peer mentors debate their views and then prioritize the most important things to increase value and de-risk the venture quickly within the incubation period. Besides, meetings will be held for all the admitted ventures, mentors, industry experts and partners. Mentors of each venture will report the progress and upcoming plans on the stage to receive constructive suggestions openly.

Business Support - Potential CEO Matching

To better support deep-tech ventures founded by scientists who may not have a strong business background, we train a pool of potential CEOs and facilitate structured matching opportunities between these trained CEO candidates and the ventures.

Business Support by Elite Business Students

Students from a bespoke MBA course will support the venture and its mentor group. Each venture will be paired with a student to assist venture founders, who are scientists rather than businessmen, to investigate potential markets, find solution for competition, and explore funding options under the guidance of the mentors

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Services

Expert-Led Training Sessions

Renowned experts from academia, industry, and the business sector will lead the training sessions, sharing insights on commercialization, technology trends, deep-tech startup launch and scaling strategies, and industry practices. These sessions are designed to help start-up founders understand where their technology readiness and business readiness and identify how their technologies can be applied in real-world industry settings.

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Founding Team

Our team members bring their unique professional backgrounds and expertise to foster the growth and success of deep-tech ventures in Hong Kong and beyond throughout the program.

Chen FONG

Prof Chen Fong is currently the Professor Emeritus of the Faculty of Medicine, University of Calgary. He is also the Co-Chair of the Global Strategy Board of the Creative Destruction Lab; a platform for mentoring of young entrepreneurs.

Kevin AU

Prof. Kevin Au is the Director of CUHK Centre for Entrepreneurship. He also serves as a director for the Hong Kong Business Angel Network Ltd.(HKBAN), Family Firm Institute (US), and International Study of Entrepreneurship Education Outcomes (ISSEO).

Peter LEE

Peter is a Hong Kong based investor and founder / Chairman of Gallant Investment Partners. Over more than 15 years, Peter has grown Gallant’s investments from simple beginnings to an impressive international portfolio of private equity, venture capital and real estate opportunities.

Francis PUN

Francis is AVP, Exploratory and Industry TSG of Lenovo PCCW Solutions Limited. He has over 20 years of experience in driving business growth in the areas of innovation development, strategic programs and digital projects for the technology and industrial sectors leading teams in the APAC, EMEA and US.

Alex FONG

Dr. Fong is a scholar-practitioner. As an entrepreneur, he is a Director of GRE Manufacturing Limited and GRE Alpha Electronics Limited. As an intrapreneur, he was the former CEO of the Hong Kong General Chamber of Commerce and the former Directorate Officer of the Hong Kong government.