There was an Internet industry conference -- Cloud Valley World -- in Beijing's Economic Technological Development Area, or E-town, on Dec 12, that brought in 5,000 IT and industrial leaders who came to discuss how the Internet is changing banks, education, transportation, finance, and lifestyles and the opportunities it will bring.

This is a time when cloud computing, big data, mobile network and intelligent terminals are all seeing rapid development and when the Internet is moving into more traditional industries.

The themes of the conference, organized by E-town, the Asiainfo Group and Beijing Cloud Valley, covered "manufacturing vs Internet" forum, "telecoms vs the Internet", "finance vs the Internet", "network security vs the Internet" and "venture capital vs the Internet", giving industrial leaders a chance to share their ideas about the Internet and industrialization.

There were many industry representatives from the auto, real estate, banking, telecommunication, manufacturing, aviation, and financial sectors, who were on hand to show their latest research and ideas on future development and the ways new industries can change people's lives, and the interaction between emerging and traditional industries.

E-town has a good background especially in cloud computing and the Internet and, since 2010 when it opened a cloud computing center, has attracted over 20 billion yuan ($3.2 billion) in investment and hundreds of enterprises for a cloud computing cluster. The center is now turning its attention to other industries electronic information, biomedicines, car manufacturing, mobile communications, digital displays, and integrated circuitry.

Edited by Fang Sha and Roger Bradshaw