梁东凯宇花了十年时间克服成本和生产方面的挑战，研发出一款能够改变生活的设备：一种帮助中风患者恢复活动能力、重新学习日常动作的机械手。
Raymond Tong Kai-yu spent a decade overcoming challenges in cost and production to develop a device that could change lives: a robotic hand that helps stroke patients regain mobility and relearn everyday movements.
这位香港生物医学工程师因“希望之手”而广为人知，该设备是他在39岁那年研发的，如今已在15个国家的医院中使用，但这一过程远非一帆风顺。
The Hong Kong biomedical engineer is best known for “Hand of Hope”, which he developed 15 years ago at the age of 39.
“将科研成果转化为他人可使用的实际应用具有挑战性……研究突破和市场准入无法同时实现，”香港中文大学生物医学工程系教授梁东凯宇表示。
The device is now used in hospitals across 15 countries, but getting there was far from smooth.
在产品能够惠及更广泛人群之前，必须克服成本、制造、监管批准和市场接受度等障碍。
“It is challenging to turn scientific research products into real-life applications for others to use … breakthroughs in research and market access cannot happen at the same time,” said Tong, a professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong’s department of biomedical engineering.
梁东凯宇是少数成功将前沿医疗技术和世界级医学研究转化为实际应用、改善患者护理并治疗此前无法治愈疾病的香港先驱之一。这些应用的例子包括基因药物研发、先进诊断工具和手术机器人。
Before a product can reach a wider population, it must clear hurdles including cost, manufacturing, regulatory approval and market acceptance. Tong is one of a small number of Hong Kong pioneers in frontier medicine who have managed to turn cutting-edge healthcare technologies and world-class medical research into practical applications that improve patient care and treat previously untreatable diseases.
然而，尽管许多人的发现或发明具有开创性意义，他们仍在努力实现这一跨越——尽管香港有志成为国际生物医学创新中心。
Some of the examples range from genomic drug development and advanced diagnostic tools to surgical robots.
专家告诉《南华早报》，香港在基础和临床研究方面实力雄厚，但缺乏产业在资金和生产方面的支持，使这一目标更难实现。
Many others, however groundbreaking their findings or inventions, are still struggling to make that leap – despite the city’s ambition to become an international biomedical innovation hub.
为了提升竞争力，他们表示，香港需要更大胆地投资早期研究项目，扩大研究能力，并通过吸引海外未完成的项目来拓宽人才库。
Experts told the South China Morning Post that Hong Kong had strong basic and clinical research, but a lack of industry support for funding and production had made that goal harder to achieve.
在梁东凯宇的案例中，将生产转移到中国大陆使每台设备的成本从10万港元降至约3万港元。
To raise its game, they said, the city had to invest more boldly in early-stage research projects, expand research capacity and broaden its talent pool by attracting partially done overseas projects.
他还重新设计了手部装置，用轻质柔软弹性材料替代了第一代的金属和电机部件。随后又开发出更小型的版本，使身体残障儿童也能受益。
In Tong’s case, moving manufacturing to mainland China cut the cost of each device from HK$100,000 to about HK$30,000. He also redesigned the hand, replacing the metal and motor components of the first generation with lighter, soft elastic materials.
但为了获得在医院使用的医疗器械批准，童某必须花费数年时间收集临床数据并向监管机构申请认证。
A smaller version was later developed so that physically disabled children could benefit as well.
到目前为止，该设备已获得美国食品药品监督管理局的批准，并在欧盟获得认证。目前正在中国国家医疗产品管理局进行评估。
But to win approval for use as a medical device in hospitals, Tong had to spend years collecting clinical data and seeking certification from regulators. So far, the device has been approved by the United States Food and Drug Administration and certified in the European Union.
“困难在于，如果你想进入某个市场，就必须自己完成所有事情——从制造和销售到认证，”童某说，并补充道，所有这些都需要资金支持，包括来自私营部门的支持。
It is now being assessed by China’s National Medical Products Administration.
目前，香港约60%的特殊学校正在使用他的装置来训练身体残障儿童的手部运动，此外还有一些医院也在使用。
“The difficulty is that if you want to enter a certain market, you need to do everything yourself – from manufacturing and sales to certification,” Tong said, adding that all of this required funding support, including from the private sector.
杰出科学家，工业支持不足 香港大学医学院负责创新和技术转移的助理院长、教授何永基表示，该市在前沿医学研究方面具有全球竞争优势。
About 60 per cent of Hong Kong’s special schools now use his device to train hand movements in physically disabled children, in addition to its use in some hospitals.
“我们在生物医学科学以及人工智能、数字健康方面有非常扎实的基础研究，”何永基说，他是数字健康创新与技术领域的专家。
Bright scientists, little industrial support Professor Joshua Ho Wing-kei, an assistant dean at the University of Hong Kong’s faculty of medicine who oversees innovation and technology transfer, said the city was well placed globally in frontier medicine research.
“我们缺乏的是能够支持快速转化的产业，即私营部门的产业。”何永基以人工智能系统的发明为例，表示将一个想法转化为可上市的产品需要强大的信息技术专业知识。
“We have very good fundamental research in biomedical sciences as well as artificial intelligence, digital health,” said Ho, an expert in digital health innovation and technology. “What we do not have is an industry, private sector industry that can support rapid translation yet.”
“你需要硬件支持、计算机服务器、网络支持、网络安全支持——这些都超出了普通学术研究工作的范围，”他说。药物研发作为香港的战略重点之一，也需要完全不同的一套技能。
Using the invention of an AI system as an example, Ho said strong information technology expertise was needed to turn an idea into a market-ready product. “You need hardware support, computer servers, network support, cybersecurity support – these are things that are beyond normal academic research work,” he said.
“从药物候选物到制造药物，它们是完全不同的东西，”何说。“你需要更多的优化，你需要更多的数据，你需要更多的测试，才能使其成为真正的药物。”这种专业知识通常存在于大型制药公司，他说。
Pharmaceutical development, one of Hong Kong’s strategic priorities, also demands a very different set of skills. “From drug candidates to making a drug, they are completely different things,” Ho said. “You need a lot more optimisation, you need a lot more data, you need a lot more testing before it becomes an actual drug.”
何在2023年创立了一家专注于AI驱动的健康监测软件的衍生公司，他能够找到一位行业合作伙伴，帮助他应对市场。
Such expertise was usually found in large pharmaceutical companies, he said.
香港特区政府一直通过包括2022年成立的吸引战略企业办公室在内的举措，试图吸引更多企业。
Ho, who founded a spin-off company in 2023 focusing on AI-driven health monitoring software, was able to identify an industry partner that helped him navigate the market.
通过该办公室，健康科技等战略产业的主要企业已承诺在香港进行投资并创造研发岗位。
The Hong Kong government has been trying to attract more firms through initiatives including the Office for Attracting Strategic Enterprises, set up in 2022.
一些企业还预计将在位于落马洲河套区87公顷范围内的深圳-香港科技创新合作区河套深圳-香港园区设立办事处。该地区预计将通过跨境合作成为创新和技术的强大引擎。
Through the office, major companies in strategic industries, including health technology, have pledged to invest and create research and development jobs in Hong Kong. Some are also expected to set up offices in the Hong Kong park of the Hetao Shenzhen-Hong Kong Science and Technology Innovation Cooperation Zone, located in the 87-hectare Lok Ma Chau Loop.
何表示，这些企业可以与本地研究人员合作，支持有前景的研究想法。
The area is expected to become an innovation and technology powerhouse through cross-border collaboration.
他设想了一个生态系统，在这个系统中，香港的研究人员和初创企业将获得更强的产业支持。
Ho said those enterprises could work with local researchers and support promising research ideas.
“香港将变得如此有吸引力，以至于所有投资者都会前来支持我们的初创企业，而政府的公共资金可以稍作后退，”他说。
He envisaged an ecosystem in which Hong Kong’s researchers and start-ups received stronger industry backing.
是时候让产业加大投入了 上个月，行政长官李家超在香港首份五年计划中承诺，将创新活动的支出——包括研发和企业应用开发——提高到2030年左右占国内生产总值的3%，而2024年这一比例为1.63%。
“Hong Kong will be so attractive that all the investors would just come and support our own start-ups and government’s public funding can take a step back a little bit,” he said.
香港生物医药创新科技协会会长卢玉琳表示，要实现这一目标，产业界的更大参与是必不可少的。
Time for industry to invest more Last month, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu pledged in Hong Kong’s first five-year plan to increase spending on innovation activities – including R&D and enterprises’ application development – to 3 per cent of gross domestic product by around 2030, up from 1.63 per cent in 2024.
经济合作与发展组织的数据显示，在美国、德国、日本和韩国等创新驱动型经济体中，工业对研发开支的贡献率约为70%至80%，政府资助则占10%。
Lo Yuk-lam, president of the Hong Kong Bio-Med Innotech Association, said greater industry involvement would be essential to meet that target.
然而，根据香港政府统计处的数据，在香港，20世纪（注：原文2024为笔误，原文为in 2024，应译为：在2024年），政府贡献了近60%的研发开支，而本地企业约占40%。
Data from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development shows that in innovation-driven economies such as the United States, Germany, Japan and South Korea, industry contributes about 70 to 80 per cent of R&D spending, with government funding accounting for 10 per cent.
罗（音译）表示：“业界需要在研发上投入更多资金，这不能单靠政府。”他补充说，业界更多地参与也有助于推动经济发展。
In Hong Kong, however, the government contributed nearly 60 per cent of R&D spending in 2024, while local businesses accounted for about 40 per cent, according to Census and Statistics Department data. “The industry needs to invest more money in R&D this cannot rely solely on the government,” Lo said, adding that greater industry involvement could also help drive economic development.
尽管如此，罗敦促政府将更多资源投入到基础研究中，香港的基础研究目前已跻身世界前1%至2%之列。
Nevertheless, Lo urged the government to devote more resources to basic research, where Hong Kong already ranks among the world’s top 1 to 2 per cent.
他说，进一步的努力应集中于将该项工作的质量提升到前0.01%，从而使这座城市能够开展更复杂、更尖端的研究。
Further efforts, he said, should focus on raising the quality of that work into the top 0.01 per cent, enabling the city to conduct more sophisticated, cutting-edge studies.
肿瘤制药公司“健望制药”（Health Hope Pharma）创始人林顺潮表示，研究必须与资本结合才能腾飞。
Dennis Lam Shun-chiu, founder of oncology pharmaceutical company Health Hope Pharma, said research needed to be combined with capital to take off.
他表示，香港拥有吸引本地和国际投资的良好环境。香港投资管理有限公司（简称“港投公司”）于2022年成立，负责管理指定基金的投资，该公司已将生物技术和健康科技确定为投资支柱。
He said Hong Kong had a favourable environment for attracting both local and international investment. The government-owned Hong Kong Investment Corporation (HKIC), established in 2022 to manage investments from designated funds, has identified biotechnology and health technology as investment pillars.
港投公司投资资助的部分研究项目包括全球领先的人工智能驱动生物科技公司之一的英矽智能（Insilico Medicine），以及总部位于香港、专注于癌症和传染病诊断的生物科技公司“Phase Scientific”。
Some of the research projects funded by HKIC investment include Insilico Medicine, one of the world’s leading artificial intelligence-driven biotech companies, and Phase Scientific, a Hong Kong-based biotech firm focused on diagnostics for cancer and infectious diseases.
他说，经尽职调查后获得该公司支持的项目，可以鼓励本地和国际投资者效仿。通过项目吸引人才著名眼科医生和企业家林某表示，香港在药物研发等领域缺乏足够的人才。为此，他表示，城市需要启动更多研究项目以吸引人才。
Projects supported by the corporation after due diligence could encourage both local and international investors to follow suit, he said. Attracting talent through projects Lam, a prominent ophthalmologist and entrepreneur, said Hong Kong lacked sufficient talent in areas such as drug development. To address this, he said, the city needed to launch more research projects to attract talent.
“你需要具备临界质量和足够的研究项目。没有项目，人才就不会来，”林某说。扩大城市研发管道的一种方式是引入其他地方的部分完成的研究。
“You need to have a critical mass and enough research projects. Without projects, talent will not come,” Lam said. One way to expand the city’s research pipeline is to bring in partially completed research from elsewhere.
林某的公司目前已收购两种药物候选物——一种口服化疗药物和一种用于治疗年龄相关性黄斑变性的药物——这些药物在美国曾遇到监管挫折或财务困难。公司将这些研究带到香港和内地，其中三期临床试验将在此进行。
Lam’s company has so far acquired two drug candidates – an oral chemotherapy treatment and another for age-related macular degeneration – that had encountered regulatory setbacks in the United States or financial difficulties. It brought the research to Hong Kong and the mainland, where phase three clinical trials will be conducted.
他形容收购这类半成品项目为“接住飞刀”，因为早期阶段的研究大多已经完成。政府是否应加大投入？
He described acquiring such half-finished projects as “catching a falling knife”, because much of the early-stage research had already been completed. Should the government place a bigger bet?
专家表示，尽管产业支持日益重要，政府在发展前沿医学方面仍然至关重要。
Experts said the government remained crucial to developing frontier medicine, even though industry support was increasingly important.
政府于2023年启动了“产学研一加”（RAISe+）计划，以支持大学研发成果的商业化。
The government launched the Research, Academic and Industry Sectors One-plus (RAISe+) scheme in 2023 to support the commercialisation of university R&D outcomes.
该计划拨款100亿港元，已支持涵盖多个技术领域的73个项目，包括癌症免疫疗法和智能手机上的临床级血压监测。
It allocated HK$10 billion to the scheme, which has supported 73 projects across various technology areas, including cancer immunotherapy and clinical-grade blood-pressure monitoring on smartphones.
香港中文大学的汤某表示，政府倾向于资助那些看起来更可能成功、技术和商业计划更成熟的项目。
Tong, of CUHK, said the government tended to fund projects that appeared more likely to succeed and had more mature technology and business plans.
但他表示，也应给予更多支持那些具有突破潜力的先锋项目，即使它们尚未取得成功。
But he said more support should also go to pioneering projects with the potential for breakthroughs, even if they had not yet succeeded.
“如果香港只是一个追随者，或者我们只是做当前流行的东西……那也还算不错，”他说。“但如果我们想成为创新枢纽并推动研究，我们应该给那些具有突破潜力研究更多机会。”随着香港力推将生命健康科技发展为战略支柱产业之一，预计将有更多研究实验室和企业入驻标志性的河套项目，专家表示，该市通过将高校与产业结合，正走在正确的道路上。
“If Hong Kong is just a follower, or we only do what is trending right now … that is not too bad,” he said. “But if we want to be an innovation hub and drive research, we should give more chances to research with the potential for breakthroughs.”As Hong Kong pushes to develop life and health technology as one of its strategic pillar industries, with more research laboratories and firms expected to move into the flagship Hetao project, experts said the city was on the right track by bringing together universities and industry.
“如果我们妥善执行这一点，香港确实有潜力成为东方的硅谷，”香港大学的何（音）说。“我们具备了所有正确的要素。我们尚未完全实现规模化，但可能在未来五年左右，我认为我们将看到一些非常好的成果。”他强调，公众的支持将至关重要，尽管前沿医学在大多数人的日常生活中似乎还很遥远。
“If we execute this properly, Hong Kong really has the potential to become the Silicon Valley of the East,” HKU’s Ho said. “We have all the right ingredients. We are not quite scaling up yet, but probably in the next five years or so, I think we will see some really good outcomes.”He highlighted that public support would be vital, even as frontier medicine might seem remote from most people’s daily lives.
“如果你想让社会继续支持你，你需要确保他们看到具体的产出，”他说。“当香港市民感受到切实的利益时，那才是真正产生重大影响的时刻。”
“If you want the community to continue to support you, you need to make sure they see concrete products,” he said. “When the people of Hong Kong feel the benefits, that is when it makes a substantial difference.”