Dr Andy Chun Hon-wai, Chief Information Officer (CIO) at City University of Hong Kong (CityU), has received two major honours from the IT industry.

He has been named one of Asia’s 15 most outstanding IT innovators for 2010 by MIS Asia and chosen as one of the top 50 international CIO and IT leaders in social media by HorizonWatching.com, the only CIO from Hong Kong to make the list.

“Although the awards went to the CIO, they really represent the collective efforts of the entire IT team at CityU,” said Dr Chun, a leading expert in artificial intelligence and an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science. “I hope our IT work will continue to raise the visibility of CityU as an innovative institution for higher education in the region and worldwide.”

The honour from MIS ASIA, a leading IT and management publication with a circulation of over 10,600 IT chiefs in the region, recognises how Dr Chun’s work has impacted CityU and his chosen field. According to MIS ASIA: “These are the leaders who have brought about a magical change in their organisation and their chosen field and who have been recognised by the industry for their transformational efforts."

HorizonWatching.com acknowledges the importance of Dr Chun’s pro-active use of the social media to enhance transparency and communication as well as to share his views and experiences on issues and events relevant to CIOs and the IT industry.

As CIO, Dr Chun is responsible for all aspects of the University’s IT infrastructure, service and strategy for supporting teaching, learning, research and administrative operations.

Led by Dr Chun, CityU’s IT team is planning to launch an academic advising system to help CityU prepare for the new 4-year curriculum. “This new system helps students tailor their learning to their own needs and helps forecast the demand of a course, which in turn makes administration more efficient,” Dr Chun said.

Dr Chun has worked in AI research and its applications for more than 20 years. His research focuses on using AI for optimisation, scheduling, rostering, timetabling and data-mining. Recently, his research has looked at knowledge management and collaborations with Weblog and Wiki technologies.

Over the years, Dr Chun has received numerous awards. He is the only person to have received the Innovative Applications of AI Award on six different occasions from the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence. Among his award-winning projects are AI systems for the Airport Authority, Hospital Authority, MTR Corporation and HKSAR Government. He has previously been awarded the Asia-Pacific ICT Award and the HK IT Excellence Award. In 2009, the Hong Kong Computer Society honored Dr. Chun with two Outstanding IT Achiever Awards - the IT Research Award and IT Professional Competency Award.