With the rise of “Open Data” and streamline business processes, the importance of utilizing artificial intelligence with cloud solutions has equally increased as they can provide a range of algorithms to produce timely analysis for decision making and connected processes in a more secured environment.

In this regard, Hong Kong Technology Advancement Group (HKtag) with Office of the Government Chief Information Officer (OGCIO) as our funding organization, targets to hold Open Data Hackathon with conference annually since our first Hackathon on Smart Environment was held successfully in 2021. The Open Data Hackathon with series of seminars, trainings and conference on final day aims to provide insights on how Hong Kong Government sets out the datasets on the Public Sector Information (PSI) Portal (https://data.gov.hk) and Hong Kong GeoData Store (https://geodata.gov.hk/gs/), the industry experts integrate open data into effective solutions on public utilities and encourage more innovations within IT industry to utilize the government open data sources (DATA.GOV.HK) with AI and Cloud technologies. We hope the sharing at the conference and the outstanding inventions at our Hackathon Final will facilitate more intelligent digitalization around the city and as a result, contribute to building a smarter Hong Kong with an advancing and innovative atmosphere.

Starting in 2022, aside from public stream, HKtag dedicated a college stream for college and university students and added secondary stream for current secondary students. We have enriched our program with a series of Open Data Seminars as pre-hackathon knowledge sharing and promotion of our hackathon, and more technical trainings for our shortlisted contestants.

We set our theme for Open Data Hackathon focusing on key concerns picked from Hong Kong Smart City Blueprint (https://www.smartcity.gov.hk) and policy address to meet market needs and local development.