An artificial intelligence (AI) research center is to be established in Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (E-town), according to a conference targeting the development of the AI industry on April 18.

Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (E-town) hosts a conference targeting the artificial intelligence industry on April 18. [Photo/bda.gov.cn]

Representatives from more than 20 E-town-based businesses attended the conference, including leading tech business BOE and online retailer JD. The representatives exchanged views on the development and application of AI technologies with Hans Uszkoreit, director of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI).

Hans Uszkoreit gave a brief introduction of the DFKI and its latest achievements at the conference. Uszkoreit expressed his view that AI is a promising industry and sought partnerships with Chinese businesses to boost development of the industry.

Hans Uszkoreit, director of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI), delivers a speech at the conference, calling for closer Sino-German ties on boosting development of the AI industry, April 18. [Photo/bda.gov.cn]

Based in Germany, DFKI is a leading research institute with expertise in research and development (R&D) of AI. It is among the world's most recognized centers of excellence and the world’s largest AI research center in terms of number of employees and external funding.

DFKI also boasts some of the world’s leading professionals, including Wolfgang Wahlster, who is one of the initiators of Industry 4.0 and German Chancellor Angela Merkel's lead advisor on science and technology.

Sheng Licheng, E-town’s top official, addresses the conference, April 18. [Photo/bda.gov.cn]