Star founders, Beijing officials and deep-pocketed financiers converge on Shanghai by the thousands this weekend to attend China’s most important AI summit. At the top of the agenda: how to propel Beijing’s ambitions to leapfrog the US in artificial intelligence — and profit off that drive.
The World Artificial Intelligence Conference, which has featured Elon Musk and Jack Ma in years past, was devised to showcase the cutting-edge of Chinese technology. This year’s attendance may hit a record as it’s taking place at a critical juncture in the US-Chinese tech rivalry.
This week, US President Donald Trump unveiled his so-called AI Action Plan — a sort of call to arms to ensure the country keeps its lead in the post-ChatGPT epoch. At the same time, the emergence of DeepSeek in January galvanized a generation of Chinese developers to ride a nationwide investment and innovation wave. From Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. to fledgling firms such as Minimax, the country’s aspirants in the field have since moved aggressively to try and close the gap with the likes of OpenAI and Google.
“While many recognize DeepSeek’s achievements, this represents just the beginning of China’s AI innovation wave,” said Louis Liang, an AI sector investor with Ameba Capital. “We are witnessing the advent of AI mass adoption, this goes beyond national competition.”
The Shanghai conference rundown for now remains largely unknown — as it has in years past just days before kickoff. Chinese Premier Li Qiang will attend, and tech leaders from Tencent Holdings Ltd. to ByteDance Ltd. and startups like Zhipu AI and Moonshot are likely to turn out in force. On Friday, shares in AI-linked Chinese companies including CloudWalk Technology Co. climbed sharply.
Here’s what we can expect from the summit starting Saturday.
DeepSeek’s Aura
Neither the startup nor its reclusive founder Liang Wenfeng feature in the advance literature for the event. And yet, the two-year-old firm is likely to be one of the topics du jour. Bloomberg