Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST)

This course discusses how innovation is a major driver of economic growth in the world today. Innovations in the information technology, pharmaceutical, manufacturing, and genetics industry have a significant impact on human life around the world. This course uses a number of short cases to introduce business scenarios and to illustrate the relevance of concepts learned in class.

This course introduces the concepts and skills essential in marketing strategy. Marketing strategy involves two basic sets of activities. The first set starts with identifying consumer needs and ends with positioning a product or service to satisfy those needs and differentiate it from competition. In between, there is rigorous analysis of the customer, the competition, the environment, and the company's own capabilities. The second set of activities revolves around the “marketing mix”, commonly referred to as the 4 P's (product, placement, price and promotion). Marketing mix activities include: letting the consumer know about the product in an attention-getting, convincing and motivating way, getting it to the consumer through the best combination of distribution channels, pricing it effectively, and offering incentives to try, purchase, and re-purchase.

This is an introductory course in computer science. It teaches programming in the Python language. Students learn to detect and fix bugs in the code on their own. The goal is to run the program so that it can return the correct output on all input instances.

Introduction to system equations, block diagrams, signal flow graphs, state-space systems, transient response using convolution integral, root locus and frequency response methods. Design by root locus, frequency response and state space method. Nyquist stability test.

This course provides students with an overall scientific understanding of our world. This course deals with fundamental questions, such as: Where does this universe come from? What is the origin of matter? What is the origin of life? What guides the human behavior? What shapes the development of the human society? What will be the future of this world? Students are expected to have Science background. Graded pass/no pass only.

This course incorporates prior learning in marketing and gives practical examples of how the basic principles are used in digital and direct marketing. The clear differences between General Advertising and Digital and Direct Marketing in customer acquisition and retention are explain in detail. There is extensive use made of videos to illustrate the principles taught, and analysis of video material is required to answer exam questions. Participation is not just encouraged, but required, thus there will be classes where you will be asked to come prepared with 2 or 3 questions either from the readings or other material presented.

The Greater Bay Area (GBA) has become the world's largest urban area. Consisting of Hong Kong, Macau and the nine cities of the Pearl River Delta, in less than forty years it has transformed from a rural backwater to an economic engine of sophisticated manufacturing and services. It has lifted millions of people out of poverty and provided them with new homes and communities. The GBA has also become an important node in a network of megacity regions responsible for much of the world's economic dynamism. For the most part, the GBA has evolved after its economic potential was unleashed by the opening up to Hong Kong and global trade networks. The twin forces of economic agglomeration and urbanization were the drivers of this growth, but were substantially supported by infrastructure development and policy, particularly from individual cities. Yet, it is thought that the region's further development will require a more sophisticated harnessing of agglomeration forces so that the GBA can compete with other highly developed bay areas. Improvements must also be made to deal with substantial environmental and social costs of the GBA's growth. This course is designed to familiarize students with the GBA. The region is more economically powerful, complex and interesting than all but a few of the world's countries. It is deserving of some appreciation. Moreover, Hong Kong has been crucial to the GBA's development and the prosperity of the GBA remains key to the prosperity Hong Kong. To understand why the region is so successful, interesting and important, we will analyze processes such as agglomeration, clustering, migration, urbanization and sustainable development. These processes led the GBA's development and will determine its future—in terms of continued economic development and more importantly in terms of the wellbeing of the GBA's people. We examine how the GBA can function as a cohesive region, but also how the actions of the cities and the diversity of activities within the cities add vibrancy. We also put the GBA's development in perspective, reflecting on the regional culture of the past and what other megacity regions tell us the GBA can be.

This course in microeconomics examines markets based on decisions made by individual actors in an economy such as consumers, firms, and government, facing scarcity of resources. This course covers key concepts in microeconomics and basic tools to understand an allocation mechanism of markets. Topics: theory of the firm in a free enterprise system; theory of consumer demand; market structures and resource allocation; and selected topics on government regulation.

This course gives an overview on the relationships between human health, environment, and sustainable development. Topics include the development and objectives of environmental impact and risk assessment; impacts of environmental quality (including air, water, wastes, ecology) and health risks; assessment and mitigation, public participation; sustainable development. Case studies and guest lectures are included.

This course introduces the fundamental scientific knowledge about human thinking and behavior processes, and illustrates the relevance of this knowledge to the betterment of human performance and well-being in a wide variety of settings in the society (e.g., education, business, healthcare). Topics include but are not limited to sensation and perception, sleep and dreams, learning, memory, intelligence, personality, development, psychological disorders, and health. This course is also prerequisite for students who want to study psychology further.