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To: ms.smartest.person who wrote (165)	1/27/2001 11:35:09 PM
From: ms.smartest.person	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 2248

CyberPort aims to redesign dotcom map LYDIA ZAJC -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- What would be the ultimate office environment to cradle a developing dotcom? Start with zippy telecommunications, add handy technology support, broadcast studios, library, cafés, stores, residences and more, all at one's fingertips. That was the proposed vision for Hong Kong's CyberPort, a 24-hectare site on the western shores of Hong Kong Island that was estimated to cost HK$15.8 billion, said James Snelling. Mr Snelling, managing director of the Broadcast Design Group (BDG), helped create the plans for the project, which is meant to thrust Hong Kong into its future as an Asian hi-tech hub. He recently unveiled some of these plans at a Canadian Chamber of Commerce breakfast seminar. BDG, founded in Hong Kong in 1985, designs projects that meld broadcast and telecommunications components. The company has done work in Asia and the Americas and has several businesses, which include designing telecommunications networks and creating corporate e-commerce networks. Mr Snelling, who has a long design career, has been cited on an Emmy Award given to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation for technical achievement in the large-scale digital broadcasting systems area. BDG has worked with NOW TV's Web and television facility, Star TV and IBM, among others. The firm was hired more than a year ago to help turn the CyberPort vision into reality. Cyberport has already attracted tenancy interest from 15 major firms, including IBM, Microsoft and Cisco Systems. Each prospective tenant brought its own needs to the project, Mr Snelling said. "You have to make some guesses and anticipations based on tenant interest, [and] as the requirements change, you have to take your best shot at it." CyberPort, which started as an idea on a napkin, was now only a piece of churned earth, said Mr Snelling. The companies involved are working on the modest first phase and must turn it over to the Government in about a year. Officials guiding CyberPort have grand plans. However, critics have pointed out that it is mostly a residential property development, with some office space. According to its master plan, housing space will take up about three-quarters of the 537,000 square metre development. CyberPort officials are hoping that it will become a breeding ground for Hong Kong's next big companies by fostering small and medium-size enterprises (SMEs) that will add to the area's cyber-economy. "The real goal of CyberPort is to attract SMEs," Mr Snelling said. As a result, the designers have attempted to build in a clustering environment along the "backbone" of IT (Information technology) Street, a corridor where most of the networks and facilities will be installed. The facilities include two studios for television broadcasts - so companies can create their own productions or training pieces with video-over-Internet protocol capacity - a computer graphics laboratory and a "cyber-library" with digitised information and its own printing capability. The CyberPort's facilities are designed to lure some of the region's film dubbing operations. Though Hong Kong was centrally located for the film dubbing industry, a good deal of the work was done in Australia, Mr Snelling said. CyberPort would also have two network operations centres so that all communications could be routed, monitored and controlled, Mr Snelling said, plus an in-house maintenance and information technology support team. The site would include conference rooms, charoom hosting, teleconferencing and Web hosting, he added. Theatres for media conferences will be located alongside leisure spots, such as cafés, a performance centre, a multi-media artwork gallery and three levels of retail space. On the technology side, CyberPort will eventually house an end-to-end optical network for real-time streaming media and enough bandwidth for the next 25 years worth of demand. "It is anticipated that this will be the first optical network in Hong Kong," Mr Snelling said. CyberPort's complete wireless coverage for mobile phones would be able to accommodate third-generation technology and streaming video, he added. BDG will work with the Hong Kong Government to develop tenders for parts of the project's design and facilities. Project construction is to be wrapped up by end 2007. technology.scmp.com