Policy Address

Regional Intellectual Property Trading Centre

73. The Government will leverage our advantages in legal, taxation and professional services to develop Hong Kong into a regional intellectual property (IP) trading centre. We will:

  1. enhance the IP legal regime – The latest amendments to the Copyright Ordinance came into force in May to strengthen copyright protection in the digital environment. We will conduct consultation next year to explore further enhancement of the Ordinance regarding protection for AI technology development;

  2. implement the "patent box" tax incentive – We will introduce a bill into the LegCo in the first half of next year to reduce the tax rate for qualifying profits derived from patents from the existing 16.5% to 5%, with a view to encouraging more R&D activities, as well as transformation and commercialisation of patented inventions;

  3. plan for regulatory arrangements on patent agent services – The Government will take the lead in discussing with stakeholders to plan for the introduction of regulatory arrangements for local patent agent services, covering professional qualification requirements and registration, as well as the regulatory model and framework, with the aim of enhancing service quality and nurturing talents; and

  4. boost trading of local original works – The Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) will enrich the Hong Kong International Film and TV Market, Hong Kong International Licensing Show and Hong Kong Book Fair, as well as its Asia IP Exchange portal, with more trading elements, such as including more business-matching activities and providing additional market information on IP trading and professional support services (such as legal, mediation and arbitration, accounting, valuation, etc.), so as to strengthen support for local original works to exploit the Mainland and international markets.