Labour minister Chris Sun said the government is currently reviewing its Top Talent Pass Scheme and considering adding more mainland universities to the approved list.

The authorities rolled out the scheme last December as part of efforts to “trawl the world for talent”.

Writing in the Ta Kung Pao newspaper, Sun said as of late March, 12,000 out of around 20,000 applications were approved.

Over 9,200 people have already received their visas and are planning to come to Hong Kong within the next six months, while some of them have already arrived.

The scheme is open to people who’ve earned a salary of HK$2.5 million or above in the past year, or those who graduated from the world's top 100 universities with at least three years of work experience over the past five years.

Sun noted that officials intend to add more mainland institutions to the list of approved universities in order to entice even more high-earning and well-educated individuals.