Sussex companies could soon be heading east after the Hong Kong Development Council and the Hong Kong Economic & Trade Office came to town.

The two organisations held a joint seminar at the Hilton Metropole hotel encouraging local new media and multimedia companies to create partenerships in Hong Kong.

Organised in conjunction with Wired Sussex, the event attracted more than 100 delegates from around Sussex and further afield.

The meeting was opened by Owen Chi, European director of the HKTDC who called the Brighton area "The British equivalent of Silicon Valley".

"Investing in Hong Kong is a chance for Sussex new media companies to use their skills base in conjunction with a sophisticated local infrastructure. The emergence of China as a huge local market is another major reason for investing," he said.

There were a number of presentations, the highlight of which was given by Dr William Lo, chief executive of Netalone, an internet company listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong.

Netalone acts as a venture catalyst that invests in pre-IPO technology companies and its present market value is more than $200 million. He laughed off hi-tech stocks setbacks. "Market cap value means very little. Things move very quickly. A few months ago we were worth $400 million," he said.

This Asian optimism in the face of market turmoil was a feature reiterated by Michael Rosenberg OBE, vice chairman of the DTI's Hong Kong action committee who has been doing business in Asia for more than two decades.

"Recently I was in China and went for an early morning walk. A wizened old man started talking to me and told me that he had been an agent for Siemens in the 1930s. He asked me to talk to them and see if he could have his agency back!" He went on to describe the Chinese as "natural entrepreneurs beating within the heart of a totalitarian state".

The Hong Kong government was also represented. Jessie Ting, deputy secretary of IT and broadcasting, spoke of the potential of the wireless market. "We have an advanced telecommunications sector with mobile phone penetration at 54%. This is second only to the Scandinavian countries," she said.

Hurdles remain for Sussex companies wishing to invest in Hong Kong. Strong cultural differences and a population that speaks Chinese as much as English are formidable barriers, but the support of company partnerships will remove these problems.

"With the help of organisations such as the HKTDC and the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region we are confident that Sussex-based companies will be able to realise opportunities in Hong Kong", said Emily Aitken, project manager at Wired Sussex.

The meeting was chaired by Dr Peter Copeland, chairman of Wired Sussex. Any companies interested in partnering with Hong Kong companies should contact Wired Sussex at infor@wiredsussex.com or telephone (01273) 666830.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.