Baptist University’s Billy Mak says rising export values also reflect higher prices for AI components and relative easing in China-US trade tensions
global AI boom, economists have told the South China Morning Post, adding that gross domestic product (GDP) growth could surpass official forecasts.
Billy Mak Sui-choi, an associate professor at Baptist University’s accountancy, economics and finance department, said global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) remained far from saturated and would continue to drive exports.
“No single country has yet been able to dominate the AI field across models, services and hardware,” he said. “As long as countries see an opportunity to compete, they will continue investing in the necessary hardware.”
Mak noted that while initial AI demand centred on Nvidia’s graphics processing units, businesses realised that a broader ecosystem was required, including memory chips, photovoltaic modules and motherboards, helping to explain Hong Kong’s strong exports and re-exports from mainland China.
exportsrose by 53.4 per cent year on year in June, as overseas demand for the region’s electronic products supporting AI pushed monthly shipments to their highest level since March 1984, when the same figure stood at 61.6 per cent.
Provisional figures released by the Census and Statistics Department on Monday showed the value of exports climbed to a record HK$641.1 billion (US$81.7 billion) after a 40.8 per cent rise in May.