10 Companies Join China's National Open Platform for Next Generation AI

Ten companies joined the National Open Innovation Platform for Next Generation Artificial Intelligence. The announcement was made at the 2019 World Artificial Intelligence Conference opened on August 29.

Each of them focuses on establishing the innovation platform in a specific area. YITU Technology (依图科技) is for vision computing, MININGLAMP Technology (明略科技) for marketing intelligence, Huawei(华为) for software and hardware infrastructures, Ping An (中国平安) for inclusive finance, HIKVISION(海康威视) for video sensing, JD.com(京东) for intelligent supply chain, MEGVII (旷视科技) for image sensing, Qihoo 360 (奇虎360) for cybersecurity, TAL (好未来) for smart education, and Xiaomi (小米) for smart home. 

Five companies have constructed open innovation platforms for China's plan of the next generation AI. In 2017, MIIT initiated new-generation AI national projects and launched four open platforms backed by Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent and iFLYTEK based upon which developers are encouraged to build their applications. In 2018, SenseTime was appointed to be the fifth national AI open platform specializing in computer vision.

On August 1, Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) publishes the Instructions for Building the National Open Platform for Next Generation Artificial Intelligence (国家新一代人工智能开放创新平台建设工作指引). It states that leading AI enterprises and research institutions should promote the establishment of AI open platforms in each vertical. Different open platforms are supposed to have clear differentiation and focuses. 

As national open platforms, the companies are expected to 1) initiate technological development in verticals; 2) promote applications along the value chain; 3) provide and share services of data, modules, applications, algorithm libraries, etc.; 4) lead small and medium companies with development and testing. Candidates who submitted applications are selected by MIIT based on the criteria, and MIIT will disqualify those who could not meet the standard. 

Read more: China Bets Big on AI: Summary of Central Government Policies