In the Northwest Fourth Ring Road of Beijing, the "magic" of innovation blooms in a feast of science and technology.
From April 25 to 29, the 2024 Zhongguancun Forum Annual Conference with the theme of "Innovation: Building a Better World" was held in Beijing. This year's forum activities set up five major sections: forum meetings, technology transactions, results release, cutting-edge competitions, and supporting activities, and nearly 120 activities were held.
Compared with the previous forum, this forum is more open, more cutting-edge, more practical and more experienced, which not only shows the rapid development pace and strong potential of the mainland in the field of scientific and technological innovation, but also builds a platform for global scientific and technological exchanges and cooperation.
The new site of the Zhongguancun Forum, Zhongguancun International Innovation Center, has become a "science and technology cultural living room" and a new landmark of urban development with its unique architectural design and advanced scientific and technological facilities. Photo courtesy of the Organizing Committee of Zhongguancun Forum
Debut at the new venue
It has become a "science and technology parlor" and a new landmark of the city
Under the blue sky and white clouds, between the distant mountains and trees, a building cleverly connects the undulating green roof with the surrounding green slope, and the view from a distance seems to be a part of the natural growth of the earth. This building is the new venue of the Zhongguancun Forum for the first time - Zhongguancun International Innovation Center.
There are a total of 16 conference rooms, which can be divided into up to 28 conference rooms, which can accommodate more than 5,600 people at the same time...... In January this year, the Zhongguancun International Innovation Center was completed, and with its unique design and complete functionality, it has become a "science and technology and cultural living room" and a new landmark for urban development.
On April 25, the opening day of the forum, as soon as a reporter from China City Daily entered the Zhongguancun International Innovation Center, he saw that the consultation front desk was full of people.
"My name is Xiaoqi, and I'm happy to answer your questions or help. The "speaker" is a "receptionist" with short ear-length hair and "armor" - the bionic humanoid general intelligent robot "Xiaoqi". This "receptionist" not only resembles a real person, but also mimics a variety of human movements and expressions. According to reports, Xiaoqi applies multimodal fusion technology and exclusive Chinese corpus GPT model, and has the ability to listen, see, speak, answer and think.
Turning around from the side of the consultation desk, the reporter saw a special "guide", a robot "Xiaoguan" that integrates naked-eye 3D aerial imaging technology and AIGC (generative artificial intelligence) technology. With media-free, interactive aerial imaging, viewers can simply tap "air" with their hands to trigger the relevant function.
It is worth mentioning that at this year's forum, this "visible and intangible" aerial imaging technology has been applied in many scenarios such as elevator buttons, teleprompters for delegates, and toilet sink buttons, bringing a more hygienic experience to participants.
"Science and technology conference" has always been the characteristic concept of Zhongguancun Forum, and it is also one of the highlights of Zhongguancun Forum, and this year it is to make full use of modern scientific and technological means to improve the efficiency and participation of the conference.
For example, the metaverse venue has been fully upgraded, with the sci-fi "outer space base" as the main body, users can create personalized avatars, watch the content of the conference in the metaverse venue, and interact with other participants.
In addition, a coffee robot that can pull art, an exclusive digital human poster, and customized computer embroidery...... The innovative technology products scattered throughout the venue not only brought a different experience to the guests, but also "spoiled" how new technologies and new products will enrich people's lives in the future.
Participants interact with the bionic humanoid general intelligent robot "Xiaoqi". Photo by Zheng Xinyu
Demonstration of new technologies
Significant progress has been made in large models
In addition to the cutting-edge competition, this year's forum will also carry out ideological collision and scientific and technological exchanges around 6G, brain-computer interface, blockchain, synthetic biology manufacturing and other cutting-edge fields of science and technology in parallel forums, results release and technology transactions. Among them, there is a lot of discussion about AI large models.
"Two years ago, the level of large AI models could probably reach the level of ordinary people, that is, they could answer 34 out of 100 questions correctly. Kai-Fu Lee, chairman of Sinovation Works and CEO of 010000, said that after two years of development, the best large model can answer 90% of the questions correctly, "It is conceivable that in another two years, the AI large model will have a huge opportunity." ”
It is worth mentioning that this year's Zhongguancun Forum also set up an "Artificial Intelligence Theme Day" for the first time. On April 27, the forum held a number of thematic forums and released a number of important results around the key links and key elements of the artificial intelligence industry chain, such as general artificial intelligence, trustworthy AI, medical AI, and the integration of 6G and AI.
The reporter noticed that among the many achievements, Vidu, the first self-developed video model in mainland China, attracted countless attention.
"All it takes is a text command to generate a 60-second video that is delicate and detailed. "In February this year, the appearance of the large model of Wensheng video Sora set off a thousand waves for a while.
This time, Tsinghua University and Shengshu Technology officially released the video model Vidu, which supports one-click generation of high-definition video content up to 16 seconds and resolution up to 1080P, which is the first video model in the world to make a major breakthrough since the release of Sora.
E Weinan, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and professor of Peking University, believes that the ecology of large models in the future should include model training, databases, knowledge bases, and agent platforms.
During the interview, the reporter also learned that embodied intelligence is regarded as the next wave of artificial intelligence development. The industry generally believes that humanoid robots may be an important carrier of embodied intelligence, and the industrial field is expected to become the fastest application scenario for embodied intelligence.
"We plan to release humanoid robots for home use in five years. It can help people pick up and place items from all over the house, use some household appliances, such as microwave ovens to heat food, and do some three-dimensional cleaning, such as wiping tables, mirrors, and other things that current robot vacuums can't do. Wang He, founder of Galaxy General Robot, said.
New results released
The industry of the future shines on the future
As an important base for scientific and technological innovation, Zhongguancun has played a key role in promoting the transformation and upgrading of the mainland's economy and enhancing its international competitiveness in recent years.
The reporter learned from the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission and the Zhongguancun Management Committee that up to now, Zhongguancun has more than 17,000 national high-tech enterprises. In 2023, the total revenue of enterprises above designated size in Zhongguancun is expected to exceed 8.6 trillion yuan.
Yu Yingjie, member of the Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal Party Committee and Secretary of the Education Working Committee, said that Beijing is fully supporting Zhongguancun to accelerate the construction of a world-leading science and technology park, with the development of new quality productivity as the main line, the strengthening of innovation as the guide, and the pilot reform as the driving force to promote the rapid development of Zhongguancun.
"Now, on average, a technology-based company is born in Beijing in less than five minutes. Zhang Jihong, Secretary of the Party Group and Director of the Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission and Zhongguancun Management Committee, said.
The 5 minutes not only demonstrated the speed of Beijing's scientific and technological innovation, but also represented the vigorous vitality of the mainland's development of science and technology.
On April 25, at the opening ceremony of the 2024 Zhongguancun Forum Annual Conference, ten major scientific and technological achievements of the mainland were unveiled, including the "Zhongguancun World-Leading Science and Technology Park Construction Plan (2024-2027)", all-analog optoelectronic intelligent computing chips, original theories and materials of corner boron nitride optical crystals, quantum cloud computing power cluster, 300 MW F-class heavy-duty gas turbine to complete the final assembly, the third-generation "Xiangshan" RISC-V open-source high-performance processor core, the analysis and application of the saline-alkali tolerance mechanism of crops, and "Beibrain No. 2". "Intelligent brain-computer systems, etc.
These achievements, ranging from an optical crystal to a heavy-duty gas turbine, are milestones in their respective fields and inject strong impetus into the development of future industries.
Liu Wenqiang, Secretary of the Party Committee and Vice President of China Electronic Information Industry Development Research Institute, said that at present, the future industry of the mainland is in a critical period of innovation vitality, radiation capacity and comprehensive strength to achieve a great leap forward, and it is necessary to further accelerate the breakthrough of disruptive technology, optimize the industrial ecosystem, improve the fault tolerance and correction mechanism, increase the promotion of typical cases, inject new vitality into the construction of a modern industrial system, and create a new engine for the high-quality development of the industry.
Reporter's Codex
Innovation empowers the future here
The amount of information, the full of dry goods, and the full of science and technology are the most profound feelings of this reporter when he participated in the Zhongguancun Forum.
On the eve of the opening of the Zhongguancun Forum, the Organizing Committee of the Forum organized a series of interview activities, ranging from basic scientific research to industrial application transformation, from business incubation to regional cooperation...... Every field shines with the light of scientific and technological innovation, and every topic is full of "futurism".
After the opening of the forum, whether it was the science and technology experience projects scattered throughout the conference hall, the wonderful speeches and discussions in the venue, or the release of cutting-edge achievements, all demonstrated Beijing's strong strength in scientific and technological innovation, and also reflected the huge potential of the mainland in the field of scientific and technological innovation.
After 5 days of meetings, there is often a feeling that the brain capacity cannot keep up with the surging information flow. But every new word, every new achievement, is like opening a new door, leading participants into the wider world of the future.
Although the conference will come to an end, the pace of innovation will never stop. I firmly believe that the innovative spirit of not being willing to stick to success, not being afraid of failure, and not being empty talk will not only inject new impetus into the mainland's scientific and technological progress and social development, but will also lead people to continue to advance on the road of pursuing a better life.
■Source: China City Daily reporter Zheng Xinyu