Innovation and entrepreneurship competition offers $1.55m to projects

The opening ceremony of the 2018 Guangzhou Thero International Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition commenced in Guangzhou on June 19, with awards worth over 10 million yuan ($1.55 million) being offered to projects selected through the previous event.

The 2018 event was held at the South China University of Technology and features sub-competitions held in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, as well as nine overseas competitions. The event is intended to serve as a platform for showcasing innovative resources from across the globe.

At the ceremony, Chen Jiameng, head of Tianhe district, presented the accomplishments of the Thero International Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competitions and explained the impact the competitions have had on the district.

In 2017, Tianhe spent a total of 2.1 billion yuan developing science and technology, and in 2018, the figure will stand at 2.5 billion, according to Chen. The district has built six innovative platforms to meet the demands of innovators and entrepreneurs. It has also built China's first venture capital plaza and two venture capital funds.

Tianhe has been devoted to invigorating innovation and entrepreneurship by offering more preferential policies and better services and platforms, Chen said. 

The ceremony also saw the founding of an incubation center for information innovation jointly launched by Guangzhou-based technology company SiE, QF Capital and a local maker space. The center will focus on upholding the national innovation and entrepreneurship strategy, fully integrating social resources, corporate resources, and upstream and downstream ecological resources, and building a seamless docking platform for cutting-edge technology, innovative companies, investment projects, and innovators. This will help more innovative entrepreneurs realize their dreams and enterprises transform and improve.

The Guangzhou Thero International Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition has become one of the most influential innovation and entrepreneurship events in China. In the past three years, it has attracted more than 5,000 participants and has served more than 10,000 entrepreneurs. It has also built a lineup of more than 600 ultra-luxury review experts and entrepreneurial mentors, and has contributed over 500 million yuan in investment and directly helped over 50 winning projects settle in Tianhe district.

Artificial intelligence expert Li Yuanqing from the South China University of Technology and semi-conductor component expert Luo Hongwei from the China Electronic Product Reliability and Environmental Testing Research Institute were invited to the event to give their insights into some hot topics, such as machine-brain interaction technology and the development of the Chinese chips industry.