Shanghai Officials Visit Silicon Valley to Invite Top Execs to AI Conference
Liao Shumin
DATE:  Jul 26 2018
/ SOURCE:  Yicai
Shanghai Officials Visit Silicon Valley to Invite Top Execs to AI Conference Shanghai Officials Visit Silicon Valley to Invite Top Execs to AI Conference

(Yicai Global) July 26 -- Government officials from Shanghai visited Silicon Valley last week in a bid to tempt some of its top artificial intelligence firms to attend a global conference scheduled to take place in China's largest city this fall.

Chen Mingbo, head of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization, led the delegation to offices for some of the region's top firms, including Google, Tesla and Intel, state-backed news site The Paper reported. The officials invited top executives from the firms, including Google boss Sundar Pichai, to the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in September.

Chen also talked of Shanghai's industrial foundation and future priorities to encourage the firms to ramp up business development and investment in the city, and wants to see the likes of Verily Life Sciences, software maker Synopsys and autonomous vehicle maker Pony.ai setting up offices there.

The officials also spoke with local venture capital companies and test rode driverless cars made by Baidu, Pony.ai and Google affiliate Waymo, whose vehicles it praised for providing the smoothest ride.

Some of China's top government agencies, including its top economic planner the National Development and Reform Commission, are organizing the WAIC. It will span three days with a focus on empowerment through artificial intelligence.

Editor: James Boynton

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Keywords:   AI,Shanghai,Silicon Valley,GOOGLE