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As the Hong Kong Legislative Council election 2012 draws near, the two IT functional constituency candidates Charles Mok and Samson Tam explain to Asia Cloud Forum the cloud computing policies in their election platforms.

In this Part II of a three-part interview, Mok (pictured, above) and Tam (pictured, below right) suggest ways to cater to Hong Kong's increasing demand for cloud professionals, and propose ways to support cloud adoption among local small and medium businesses (SMBs). (Read Part I and Part III here)

Part I: How to best position Hong Kong in China's strategy cloud roadmap, and ways to distinguish Hong Kong from the other five existing cloud hubs in China.
Part III: The latest issues with internet freedom in Hong Kong, and the actions Mok and Tam took to defend internet freedom in the city in the past few years.

Asia Cloud Forum: Does Hong Kong lack cloud computing professionals? What specific skills sets are in hot demand?

"SMBs in Hong Kong have already started to adopt cloud computing."   -- Samson Tam, candidate for HK Legco election (IT) 2012

Charles Mok: I think so, but this is evolving very quickly. Specific skills in building private or public clouds as a service will be in hot demand. Skills in implementing IaaS (infrastructure-as-a-service) and PaaS (platform-as-a-service) will also be in large demand.

If you were elected, what specific actions will you take to nurture cloud computing professionals in Hong Kong?

Mok: In the past, for example, when I was in Hospital Authority as a board member, and I saw the need/lack of professional skills/supply, I helped work with a local university to develop specific discipline to train students in that field. I will do the same for cloud computing, and link up the industry with the academic sector to improve people/skill supply.

Describe the current and anticipated demands for "Cloud Infrastructure Architects" and "Cloud Application Architects" in Hong Kong.

Samson Tam: [Editor's note: In Samson Tam's election platform, he proposed that the government support and assist in the certification of practitioners with specific skills, such as "Business Analyst", "Cloud Infrastructure Architect" and "Cloud Application Architect."] These are new job types. With the development of cloud computing, however, the demand for these new job types will definitely grow.

If you were elected, what specific actions will you take to nurture cloud infrastructure architects in Hong Kong?

Tam: As a legislator, I will do my best to drive the development of cloud computing. As for specific job types, they can only develop along the development of the cloud computing.

Which organization(s) do you propose to provide certification?

"Low [cloud adoption rate among Hong Kong SMBs] if we consider usage beyond hosting or web mail, etc. "   -- Charles Mok, candidate for HK Legco election (IT) 2012

Tam: The decision does not rest with me. It needs the consensus of the professional IT bodies [in Hong Kong].

What are the foreseeable challenges in driving both the set up and the adoption of such certification by companies in Hong Kong. How would you help overcome these challenges?

Tam: The biggest challenge is to enable joint participation among all stakeholders within the IT industry, in order to solve the problems as they work together. As a legislator, I am willing to take the role of bridging the parties together.

What are the general cloud adoption trends among Hong Kong SMBs?

Tam: SMBs in Hong Kong have already started to adopt cloud computing. But still, the market has much potential for development.

Mok: Low [adoption rate] if we consider usage beyond hosting or web mail, etc. But among technical SMBs (small developers), the usage for public cloud services like Amazon Web Services is actually quite high.

What sort of cloud computing/services are most commonly adopted by Hong Kong SMBs?

Tam: According my understanding, local SMBs tend to focus more on these areas in cloud computing adoption: business application, point-to-point application and social network.

Mok: See answers to the question above.