With awareness of Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) concerns growing among the financial, industrial and commercial sectors, the difficulties involved in ESG implementation and value creation are also in the spotlight.
To draw insights on these issues, Cyberport hosted the “Cyberport FinTech for ESG Conference 2021” in September, gathering ESG pioneers from the financial, industrial and commercial sectors together with Cyberport community companies to explore how FinTech can enhance efficiency for implementing ESG-related measures, and how companies can enjoy the economic benefits offered by the global ESG trend.
The conference attracted 200 participants from the financial, industrial, commercial and innovation and technology sectors.
Dr. George Lam, Chairman of Cyberport, shares in his remarks that businesses should see ESG as an essential aspect of modern risk management as well as a significant source of business opportunities, rather than as merely a burden or an obligation. The key to unlocking this potential is ‘technology’. “ESG and FinTech have become global trends. Hong Kong must combine their complementary capabilities in order to maximise their effectiveness and maintain our advantage as Asia's leading international financial, asset management and risk management centre,” said Dr. Lam.
In a discussion session, Cyberport Incubation Programme (CIP) alumnus ESG Matters introduced their self-developed data management system, ESG Dashboard, which is designed to allow companies to collect ESG data during daily operations. Cyberport start-up ProMEX Limited’s digital trading platform for physical commodities (including green metals) imposes less environmental impact during their production processes, with the aim of promoting transparency, fairness and efficiency.
Managing ESG risks and uncovering investment value is also important. FV Financial Intelligence Group, a member of the Cyberport community and a credit rating agency licensed by the Securities and Futures Commission, is developing a set of ESG credit rating standards, such that systemisation of the rating process for enhanced efficiency and transparency is enabled with the help of AI, which makes ratings both timely and available to more companies. Seleya Technologies, a start-up under the Cyberport Creative Micro Fund (CCMF), introduced self-developed ExpertAI ESG system designed for the evaluation of ESG performance, financial performance and investment targets’ prospects.
