After a busy year in 2012, which saw the launch of several government mobile apps, a next generation GovWifi programme, and further development of the government’s ambitious plans for a private cloud platform, Daniel Lai, Government CIO, Hong Kong, has much planned for 2013.
Updated ICT Blueprint
Lai informed FutureGov that in 2013, the OGCIO will be reviewing and updating Hong Kong’s Digital 21 Strategy. First promulgated in 1998 as the blueprint for ICT development in Hong Kong, the strategy has been updated three times, last in 2008.
“In view of technological advancement and industry development since 2008, like cloud and mobile computing, it is time for another major review in order to maintain Hong Kong’s competitiveness”, said Lai. “The review will come up with long-term goals and strategies which can sustain and drive Hong Kong’s ICT development and economic growth in the years to come”.
The first phase of the review, which involved engagement with the industry, professional bodies, and academia, has ended. The OGCIO will create a draft blueprint and conduct a public consultation in the next step.
E-government infrastructure
OGCIO will deploy a new, third generation hosting platform for e-government services in Hong Kong this year. “The government has already appointed a contractor through an open tender to implement a new hosting infrastructure for supporting Government-to-Business (G2B) and Government-to-Citizen (G2C) applications”, stated Lai. “The infrastructure will be available to different departments, and will be scalable to meet actual demands of different organisations”.
This new platform will be cloud-enabled, and will support an e-payment gateway, messaging firewalls, and user authentication services to reduce the development time for e-government services. Services such as Hong Kong’s e-TAX, appointment booking for ID card applications, and the government’s notifications and alerts app, will be migrated to the new infrastructure.
The infrastructure will be rolled out in mid-2013, and will support up to 100 additional e-government services by 2015.
OGCIO will also facilitate the decelopment of data centres for the business community this year. “We will continue to implement our established strategy to achieve this objective”, said Lai. This strategy includes providing land, encouraging better use of existing industrial buildings, providing a one-stop support service for data centres, and setting up government measures to promote data centre development.
Digital inclusion
Another area that the government will prioritise in 2013 is bringing ICT to more people in Hong Kong. Under a sponsorship scheme, OGCIO provided HK$2 million (US$257,000) to local industry developing mobile applications for under-privileged groups and helping them enhance their quality of life through the adoption of ICT. These applications will be launched in 2013.
OGCIO is also partnering with the Equal Opportunities Commission to award businesses that make their websites accessible for people with disabilities.
Cloud computing
“A major priority this year will be to implement the government cloud platform (GovCloud)”, declared Lai. The HK $127 million (US $16.3 million) contract for GovCloud as awarded in March.
“We have kick-started the implementation work with an aim to launching the GovCloud service before the end this year in order to bring the benefits of cloud computing to government departments as soon as possible”, stated Lai.
The government will also focus on introducing more datasets on Hong Kong’s open data portal, developing more apps for delivering government services, and exploring the establishment of an IT professional certification in Hong Kong.
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Autor(en)/Author(s): Sumedha Jalote
Quelle/Source: futureGov, 14.05.2013
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