China is not only going head-to-head with Western tech companies but is gearing up for quicker development in the hottest area of modern technology: artificial intelligence.
In a report from The Wall Street Journal, experts noted how investors in the Middle Kingdom are focusing on getting ahead in the artificial intelligence race.
Even though news headlines highlight business acquisitions made by the Chinese, several business experts believe that the Asian business-minded population is aiming for something bigger aside from conquering existing business models.
China in the AI Race
Talking to the WSJ, former Microsoft and Google executive Kai-Fu Lee revealed that China is preparing to become the fastest developer of artificial intelligence.
"China is poised to be a leader in AI because of its great reserve in AI talent, excellent engineering education, and massive market for AI adoption," Lee explained.
Lee is now the chief executive of Sinovation Ventures, formerly known as China's Innovation Works.
For over three years, he and his company have invested as much as $100 million in 25 startup companies both in the U.S. and China that are related to artificial intelligence.
Among the top AI-related projects China is looking into include search engine optimization with voice recognition features as well as driverless cars that make use of artificial intelligence to run, competing head-on with Google.
"Google's driverless technology leads the world, and autonomous driving is the operating system of cars. If we don't stand up to [the] challenge, we may have to use American technology [again] in the future," Didi founder and Chief Executive Cheng Wei stated.
According to him, the first half of the Internet age which include introducing connecting people via computers has come to an end.
"The second half is about artificial intelligence," he added.
Current AI-Related Projects
Aside from the business sector, China's military force is also looking into the application of artificial intelligence in their field.
In a Reuters report last week, China Aerospace and Industry Corp.'s Wang Changqing revealed their plan to adopt AI-powered cruise missiles for the military.
"We plan to adopt a 'plug and play' approach in the development of new cruise missiles, which will enable our military commanders to tailor-make missiles in accordance with combat conditions," Wang said.
According to Wang, artificial intelligence will allow cruise missiles to become automated which would mean that military commanders would be able to focus on other tasks after firing them.
"They will allow commanders to control them in real time manner, or to use a fire-and-forget mode, or even to add more tasks to in-flight missiles," he said.