Hangzhou ranks 4th in AI companies in China

Hangzhou, an emerging technological hub in East China's Zhejiang province, ranks fourth in terms of the number of artificial intelligence (AI) companies in China, according to figures from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology.

Official statistics reveal that by September last year, Hangzhou, a city with a developed AI industry, boasted 75 hi-tech companies dedicated to AI technologies, ranking 12th worldwide and fourth in China, following Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen.

AI technologies are making their way into people's lives, said Pan Yunhe, an AI expert from the Chinese Academy of Engineering.

"Great changes will take place in cultural and creative industries within the next five to 10 years; I hope that changes can take place in Hangzhou," Pan predicted.

For example, advanced eye-glasses for visually impaired or blind people have been developed by a Hangzhou-based company, providing navigation support and helping blind people to avoid obstacles and walk up and down stairs.

Concerned about the next generation of AI development in Hangzhou, Pan suggested that the city should strive to enhance basic research, the information environment, and technology development as well as government-industry cooperation in hopes of taking the lead in uncharted areas of the AI industry.

In 2017, China issued a development plan on the next generation of artificial intelligence, aiming to achieve important progress in big data intelligence, cross-medium intelligence, swarm intelligence, hybrid enhanced intelligence, and autonomous intelligence systems by 2020.