State-of-the-Art Technology Can Replace HKTV’s Deadly Animal Tests, PETA Says

Hong Kong — After Hong Kong Technology Venture Company Limited (HKTV) Founder and CEO Ricky Wong defended gruesome experiments on sheep and pigs—who had their heads and limbs cut off and kept alive for up to 7 hours and 46 hours, respectively—during the company’s June 2 shareholder meeting, PETA U.S. sent a letter responding to his claims and urging an immediate end to the tests.

PETA U.S. points out that HKTV funds these experiments in part by commissions and fees paid by merchants that sell products to consumers via HKTV’s subsidiary, HKTVmall, which is Hong Kong’s largest e-commerce platform. At least three companies—cosmetics giant Lush Asia Limited, companion animal health product company Pawfect Reborn, and meal delivery service Fitasty—have issued public statements cutting ties with HKTVmall over this issue.

HKTV has mutilated animals in dozens of experiments since 2022, purportedly to develop and refine equipment designed to maintain the viability of detached body organs, such as limbs and heads. The company’s board admits that the experiments are purely exploratory, highly speculative, and offer “no assurance” of future clinical benefits to humans—yet HKTV has already invested HK$44.5 million and plans to invest at least another HK$50 million annually.

In its letter to HKTV, PETA U.S. details numerous viable, human-relevant research methods—including the use of organs from donors rejected for transplantation, organoids, computational models, and stem cell–derived technologies—that can be used to study and improve human health in limb transplantation, organ preservation, and tissue regeneration.

A PETA supporter protests outside the HKTV shareholder meeting on June 2.
Credit: PETA Asia

In its letter to HKTV, PETA U.S. writes, “Preclinical experiments, largely conducted on animals, consistently fail to produce meaningful results, as 95% of all new drugs that test safe and effective in experiments on animals fail in human clinical trials.” The letter adds, “The experiments conducted by HKTV will face the same fundamental issue until they are conducted using human-relevant methods.”

The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government Department of Health has also confirmed that these experiments are not conducted within Hong Kong, raising serious questions about transparency, ethics, and oversight.

Pigs recognise their own names and sleep together in “pig piles” with their closest friends, and sheep can remember 50 different faces and leap with excitement when they see their family—but in HKTV-funded experiments, these thinking, feeling animals are chopped up and decapitated in terrifying tests.

PETA Asia – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to experiment on” – points out that when it comes to the ability to feel pain, hunger, and thirst, a sheep is a dog is a boy. For more information, please visit PETAAsia.com or follow PETA Asia on X, Facebook, or Instagram.

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