Hong Kong Design Centre’s Design Incubation Programme (DIP) Graduation Ceremony and networking event came to a successful end today at InnoCentre, Kowloon Tong. The guests of honour included Mrs. Janet Chu, Assistant Head of Create Hong Kong of HKSAR Government and Mr. Freeman Lau, Vice-Chairman of Board of Directors, Hong Kong Design Centre and Dr. John Lo, Senior Consultant of Hong Kong Design Centre and Chairman of Design Admission Panel, Design Incubation Programme. HKDC celebrated the graduation of 17 bright design incubation companies.

This year DIP Graduation Ceremony presented the theme of “Talent, Business, Passion”, which are the elements possessed by a design-thinking entrepreneur. Dr. John Lo, Senior Consultant of Hong Kong Design Centre and Chairman of Design Admission Panel, Design Incubation Programme said, “this 2-year programme provides a conducive learning opportunity for incubatees to develop their “soft-aspects” of business that emphasize business knowledge, experience enrichment, as well as a well-balanced and all-round framework to help incubatees meet the challenges during their early and critical stage of development.” He continued, ”after having gone through the 2 year DIP program, the program has helped them to be better prepared to do good business in the competitive design industry and the business market on local and international fronts. DIP helped to nurture and has turned them into polished diamond from a raw diamond.”

Since the programme has started in 2005, the participated incubation companies have been awarded numbers of international design awards which include Red Dot Award, IIDA Global Excellence Award and HKDA Global Design Awards etc. Through DIP platform, industrial and business sectors can take this opportunity to develop business partnerships with outstanding design start-ups and young designers.

During the ceremony, two of the graduated design companies, Flamesquads Creative Limited and Chill Creative Company, discussed the experience of participating in the program, and how DIP nurtured their industry knowledge to develop into a successful creative venture.

The list of 17 graduated companies of Design Incubation Programme in the year of 2013-2014 are as below:

English Name	Chinese Name	Design Disciplines
Aria Studio Limited	悅創作室	Visual/ spatial arts
BITE: design	一口設計	Branding/ packaging
Cecilia Ma Couture Limited	詩馬時裝有限公司	Fashion
Chill Creative Company	-	Branding/ packaging
Coucou Bebe International Limited	嗨嗨貝貝國際有限公司	Product
Dimple	店舖	Fashion
Flamesquads Creative Limited	火使團創作有限公司	Visual/ spatial arts
Greentrooper Limited	-	Branding/ packaging
Hangmade Design	-	Visual/ spatial arts
HKMADE Co-Operates Limited	-	Product
Invisible Park Design Limited	-	Other
JuicyApp	-	Visual/ spatial arts
Matisse Design Limited	-	Branding/ packaging
ReProduction Co.	-	Other
Studio Mango Limited	-	Product
Twisted Sisters	-	Fashion
Y-Axis Design Consultants	逆思設計	Visual/ spatial arts

Design disciplines of 157 successful applicants (From 2005 to end July 2014) are as follow: 

Design disciplines	Percentage	No. of participants
Product	29.9%	47
Visual/ spatial arts	18.5%	29
Fashion	21.0%	33
Branding/ packaging	10.8%	17
Interior/ architecture	5.1%	8
Jewelry	5.1%	8
Media & communication	5.1%	8
Others	4.5%	7
Total	100%	157