Since 2007, Innovative Entrepreneur Association (https://iea.org.hk) was established by the winners of the Innovative Entrepreneur Awards, which aims to strengthen the promotion of the spirit of “Innovative Entrepreneurship”and business education in Hong Kong and other regions, so that the winners can share their experiences and business strategies with aspiring entrepreneurs. The association has held large-scale design exhibitions abroad, including Shanghai and Taipei. Every year, IEA also organizes the “Design Licensing and Business (DLAB) Support Scheme”*, providing training and exhibition promotion support for Hong Kong’s new designers and copyright owners of licensable characters.

*Sponsored by CCIDA

The Cultural and Creative Industries Development Agency (CCIDA) (https://www.ccidahk.gov.hk) established in June 2024, formerly known as Create Hong Kong (CreateHK), is a dedicated office set up by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR Government) under the Culture, Sports and Tourism Bureau to provide one-stop services and support to the cultural and creative industries with a mission to foster a conducive environment in Hong Kong to facilitate the development of arts, culture and creative sectors as industries. Its strategic foci are nurturing talent and facilitating start-ups, exploring markets, promoting cross-sectoral and cross-genre collaboration, promoting the development of arts, culture and creative sectors as industries under the industry-oriented principle, and promoting Hong Kong as Asia’s creative capital and fostering a creative atmosphere in the community to implement Hong Kong’s positioning as the East-meets-West centre for international cultural exchange under the National 14th Five-Year Plan.

Mr. Johnson Chiang, former President of the Hong Kong Society of Illustrators (2014-2016), is the curator. Mr. Chiang is also the creator of cartoon, John Dog, which won the first runnerup of “Original Anime Human Design Competition” in 2015. He has published the creative reference book “Creativity, Come On!”, and is currently the lead instructor of the Diploma Programme in Creative Illustration organised by the Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC) Academy. Mr. Chiang has extensive curatorial experiences, including several illustration exhibitions in Hong Kong, Guangzhou, Hangzhou and Taipei, as well as serving as curator and project chairman of the “Greater China Illustration Awards”* touring exhibition, andcurator of the “Hong Kong Illustration X Creative Design Brand Exhibition” * in 2019 and the “Let’s Unbox! 2022 Hong Kong Art Tory Story Exhibition, Thailand Chapter”* in 2022.