AI Era releases white paper on AI unicorns

Chinese artificial intelligence think-tank platform AI Era recently released the 2019 White Paper on AI Unicorns, selecting China's most powerful AI unicorns or potential AI unicorns based on technical performance and brand influence.

Among them, AI unicorns in the field of automobile traffic and corporate services account for more than half of the total. Particularly prominent on the list were Zhongguancun enterprises such as ByteDance, SenseTime, 4 Paradigm and Tusimple.

In terms of the educational background of the entrepreneurial teams, Tsinghua graduates accounted for over a quarter of the total, making the university something of an incubator for AI Unicorns.

Half of Chinese AI unicorns are headquartered in Beijing

As of March 2019, there are 50 AI unicorn companies in China, with a total value of more than 3.5 trillion yuan ($521.16 billion).

Among them, there are 19 super unicorns with a valuation of over 20 billion yuan. The estimated value of AI super unicorns accounts for 90.9 percent of the total valuation of AI unicorns. Beijing is home to 28 AI unicorn enterprises.

Industry distribution of AI unicorns

When it comes to the industry distribution of China's AI unicorns, the number of unicorns in the automobile industry and business services is the largest, reaching 15 and 13 respectively; they are followed by finance, entertainment, media and hardware.

From the perspective of the industry distribution of corporate valuation, the estimated value of the financial industry is the highest, reaching 1.27 trillion yuan and accounting for 36.27 percent of the total.

AI unicorns in the corporate services industry are valued at 618.25 billion yuan, accounting for 17.65 percent of the total value. The automobile industry is ranked third, reaching approximately 575.4 billion yuan.

Industry insight

The corporate service industry holds enormous potential, while the hardware AI unicorns have a high valuation.

From the perspective of industrial development, the following five trends are present.

First, although the technological upgrading of auto-driving went cold around the world, the Chinese automobile industry is developing against this trend. Automatic driving or intelligent assisted driving technology has become standard equipment in new vehicles;

Second, the corporate service industry exhibits a promising future. The development of corporate service infrastructure related to cloud computing and big data is exploding, with internet giants and more AI unicorns entering this field.

Third, the impact of internet finance on the traditional financial industry is increasing. AI technology has promoted the upgrading of internet finance unicorns. Stricter financial supervision will make internet finance giants such as Ant Financial and Jingdong Digital stronger.

Fourth, the development of intelligent hardware has entered the era of the Internet of Things, and the hardware AI unicorns are highly valued.

Fifth, the AI+ education industry possesses fast-moving cash flow and is favored by capital. Among them, K12 education is the most anticipated division.

AI unicorns in the automobile industry: Horizon Robotics

Potential AI unicorns in the automobile industry: UISEE

AI unicorns in the corporate service industry: SenseTime, Megvii

AI unicorns in hardware industry: Cambricon

AI unicorns in software industry: Youdao, Zhihu