He was a gifted teenager who was admitted to Southeast University at the age of 14, graduated with a master's degree from the University of Hong Kong at the age of 20, and later entered Carnegie Mellon University abroad to pursue a doctorate.
The genius teenager chose the "unpopular" artificial intelligence direction at that time, made the world's first artificial intelligence three-dimensional true model, and became famous, he became a talent who was robbed by major well-known companies.
In order to retain him, Microsoft took the initiative to give in, and in this way, Shen Xiangyang became the only Chinese Vice President of Microsoft. But in 2020, successful people are willing to voluntarily give up everything in the United States and return to China to contribute.
On March 5, he became a double-appointment professor at the Institute for Advanced Study of Tsinghua University, and since then the United States has lost a major general. Shen Xiangyang, who has devoted his life to artificial intelligence research and has a patriotic heart, has a wonderful life? Let the childlike character Ji continue to talk about it.
Young genius, strength is the last word
Shen Xiangyang was born in 1966 in Nanjing, Jiangsu Province. In that era when educational resources were very scarce, it was not easy for young people to have the conditions to study and study.
But Shen Xiangyang was extraordinary. At the age of 12, it is the age when children of the same age go to junior high school, but he has already graduated from junior high school.
Less than two years later, teenagers under the age of 14 became the envy of everyone at the time, attending the now famous Southeast University. Whether in the past or now, Shen Xiangyang can be called a veritable "prodigy".
But that's not all this genius teenager's life. His university career was also completed in front of his peers, and he also received a postgraduate degree from the University of Hong Kong at the age of 20.
Later, he went abroad for further study, and Shen Xiangyang entered Carnegie Mellon University in the United States to pursue a doctorate. This time he chose a field that was rarely covered by anyone at the time — artificial intelligence.
It is also because few people have been involved, so Shen Xiangyang's research process is not easy. There is no experience that can be learned from the predecessors, and there is no more advanced research facility now.
Everything has to rely on himself, Shen Xiangyang is immersed in the field of his choice.
But even if all the difficulties are in front of him, the young man who has created legends along the way is shining again. In just 3 years, he became the first person to eat crabs – publicly releasing the world's first artificial intelligence three-dimensional true model.
This was a sensational event at the time, attracting the attention of many well-known large companies in the United States. So after graduating from his doctorate, many well-known overseas companies want to include him under his command, such as Microsoft, Apple and so on.
In order to be able to enjoy the field of artificial intelligence and work with like-minded people, Shen Xiangyang finally chose to join the industry giant Microsoft.
In 1996, Shen Xiangyang, who had just entered Microsoft's American Research Institute, started as an ordinary computer vision researcher.
It took 3 years from ordinary researcher to chief researcher to senior researcher, which shows that there is also a place for Chinese in the United States, where science and technology are developed.
However, some people will say that Shen Xiangyang's company in the United States, no matter how good, is only a researcher, and it is impossible to contact Microsoft's core technology, which is very wrong.
Excellent Chinese will indeed make foreigners jealous, but when you are good enough, the jealousy of others is not enough to be afraid, and the sentence that strength is the last word is vividly interpreted in Shen Xiangyang.
"Xiaoice" was born and became a double-appointment professor at Tsinghua University
In 2004, at the age of 38, Shen Xiangyang became the president of Microsoft Research Beijing. He founded the institute from scratch.
There are many Chinese who also love artificial intelligence here, such as Lu Qi, who is very successful in artificial intelligence, which was introduced by Shen Xiangyang.
After working at Microsoft for many years, Lu Qi returned to China to serve as president and chief operating officer of Baidu, and his departure left Microsoft with only Shen Xiangyang, a Chinese executive.
I thought that Shen Xiangyang had reached the peak of his career overseas, who could have imagined that in just 3 years, he had transformed into a global senior vice president of Microsoft?
The news was no doubt shocking, as successive Microsoft executives required American citizenship. Shen Xiangyang has been in the United States for many years, and he has the opportunity and conditions to change his nationality, but he has always insisted on his Chinese nationality.
In order to keep him, Microsoft broke its own conventions and did not force him to change his nationality, which shows that Shen Xiangyang's status in Microsoft is irreplaceable.
This can't help but make people believe that with the development of the times and the self-reliance and self-improvement of the Chinese, the world will see a strong China, and the people of the world will see a strong Chinese.
One of Shen Xiangyang's biggest contributions during his years at Microsoft was the development of the Bing search engine, and as the most important developer, he subsequently made a series of improvements to make Bing the second largest search engine in North America.
In addition, in 2016, Shen Xiangyang finally turned the artificial intelligence he had always longed for into a reality, and developed the artificial intelligence Microsoft "Xiaoice".
From the doctoral period to establish his research direction, until 2016 to translate the research results into reality, the process is undoubtedly long and arduous, but in the end he persevered, and waited for the birth of the "Xiaoice".
Standing at the forefront of the world as a Chinese, Shen Xiangyang has made China take a big step forward in the research of artificial intelligence.
But just when Shen Xiangyang already had status and achievements, and everyone thought that he would focus his life on Microsoft, he chose to resign from all overseas positions in November 2019. So where is he going?
Just when everyone was wondering about his resignation, Shen Xiangyang announced in March 2020 that he had become a double-appointment professor at Tsinghua University, and it turned out that he had chosen the same path as Lu Qi and returned to China to contribute to the motherland.
But in fact, this is only one aspect of the reason, it is rumored that his departure is actually related to the current CEO of Microsoft Ballmer.
Because Ballmer only knows how to use Windows to make money, and has not followed the development of the Internet, so that from the former industry giant, to now be left behind by Apple and Google.
Due to the deep roots and the fact that there were no major problems, the board still proposed several candidates to replace Ballmer, and Lu Qi was one of the candidates.
In the end, Lu Qi did not win the fight, but was CEO by an Indian named Nadella.
Give up overseas fame and fortune and return to China to contribute
At the same time, watching other candidates being kicked out one after another after Nadella took office, Lu Qi and he cooperated very well, but in the end, due to physical reasons, Lu Qi chose to return to China, and Shen Xiangyang took over Lu Qi's job.
But in fact, Shen Xiangyang was promoted and reused by Ballmer at the beginning, and it is not known whether he resigned because he did not want to get involved in this power struggle.
After resigning, Shen Xiangyang was not pulled into the "blacklist" by the old owner Microsoft, but was very grateful to him for his efforts for more than 20 years, for which he specially published a thank-you letter, which is enough to see that the furniture head company attaches great importance to Shen Xiangyang, after all, few Chinese can get such a high treatment in the technology giant Microsoft.
Paying is always a two-way street, which is probably the reason why Shen Xiangyang is willing to dedicate more than 20 years at Microsoft. Microsoft's thank-you letter made many people pay attention to the news of his return to China.
Because of a sudden illness in 2020, China can only carry out an application ceremony for Shen Xiangyang online, and the number of people who come to watch is as high as 100,000.
After the official induction, Shen Xiangyang's plan is to train artificial intelligence talents for China. I believe that in the future, he can lead China's artificial intelligence to the world.
Shen Xiangyang has had a life of opening and hanging since he was a child, and he chose the direction of artificial intelligence that was not optimistic at that time and insisted on it all the way.
From the first three-dimensional true model of artificial intelligence, to entering the talented Microsoft position, he proved to the world that Chinese can have its own place in Microsoft, and has become the only Executive of Chinese nationality at Microsoft, all of which comes from his strength, and his strength makes Americans awe.
It was difficult to get Microsoft's recognition, but he gave up his hard work to build the country, resolutely chose to return to China as a double tutor of Tsinghua University, and since then Microsoft has no Chinese executives.
Although Shen Xiangyang's era at Microsoft has ended, his era in China has just begun, please wait and see.
What do you think of Shen Xiangyang, who is willing to give up high-paying positions abroad and resolutely return to China to teach? Everyone is welcome to leave a message in the comment area to discuss.
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