Cohort 1 is now open for applications. Cohort 2 will be launched in September 2023.

Permanent Residents of Hong Kong aged 18 or above are eligible to join the programme.

There is no participation fee, including the training and incubation application.

No. Anyone keen to develop social innovation projects could apply for the programme. For details, please refer to Eligibility.

The elementary training is designed specifically for potential social innovators. To fully understand social innovation and develop ideas into reality, participants will join a bootcamp, maker skills workshops, online training courses and mentoring sessions. The elementary training aims to equip the participants with an entrepreneurial mindset. It covers a variety of topics, including social innovation, project management, user research, social impact measurement, decision-making and risk management, social return on investment, maker skills for prototyping, branding and marketing, pitching skills, etc.

The elementary training lasts eight weeks, and the incubation is six months long.

The programme provides the awarded incubatees seed capital of up to HK$100,000 to develop their social innovation projects. There are eight open calls during the 3-year programme. For details of open calls, please refer to Open Calls; For more information about the application, please refer to Application Procedure.

For elementary training, participants can enroll in courses and events individually; For the incubation application, applicants are required to form a team of one to five members. The principal applicant will be the point of contact. 

No, the same project will not get funding support from different government funding schemes concurrently in order to avoid duplication of resources. Applicants are required to declare their applications whether the same proposal/ project has applied for or is currently applying for the SIE Fund.

We strongly encourage every potential applicant to join the elementary training, which equips participants with skill sets for social innovation and gives them a full picture of the 6-month incubation. Completing the elementary training will be advantageous in applying to the 6-month incubation with seed capital grant.

Immediate family members of the programme staff are not allowed to join the programme in light of the potential conflict of interest. If you have any concerns about the potential conflict of interest you may have, please contact us.

Yes, you can submit multiple proposals, but each proposal should show its difference and uniqueness in terms of ideas and target groups.

For details, please refer to the Evaluation Criteria.

Yes, awarded projects are required to register their business before the start of the incubation and to open a company bank account to receive the seed capital grant.

In addition to the financial support, awarded projects will receive networking opportunities, meeting veterans and experts across various sectors and seeking their expert insights. Awarded projects can also use a makerspace for prototype development and a co-working space for meetings and events.

The seed capital grant will be released to the awarded projects in three installments during the 6-month incubation; the ratio of the grant disbursement is 50 : 40 : 10. The grant disbursement is an advanced payment that the awarded projects are required to return the unspent balance of their completed projects to the programme. 

Please contact us at [email protected] or +852 4638 0364. 

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