AI in China could add $600 billion to its economy

Considerable piece from McKinsey .... 

The next frontier for AI in China could add $600 billion to its economy

Artificial intelligence could disrupt transportation and other key sectors in China, adding significant economic value to its economy by 2030.  .... '

By Kai Shen, Xiaoxiao Tong, Ting Wu, and Fangning Zhang

The next frontier for AI in China could add $600 billion to its economy

By 2030, AI could disrupt transportation and other key sectors in China, adding significant economic value—but only if strategic cooperation and capability building occur across multiple dimensions.

In the past decade, China has built a solid foundation to support its AI economy and made significant contributions to AI globally. Stanford University’s AI Index, which assesses AI advancements worldwide across various metrics in research, development, and economy, ranks China among the top three countries for global AI vibrancy.1 On research, for example, China produced about one-third of both AI journal papers and AI citations worldwide in 2021. In economic investment, China accounted for nearly one-fifth of global private investment funding in 2021, attracting $17 billion for AI start-ups.2

Five types of AI companies in China

Today, AI adoption is high in China in finance, retail, and high tech, which together account for more than one-third of the country’s AI market (see sidebar “Five types of AI companies in China”).3 In tech, for example, leaders Alibaba and ByteDance, both household names in China, have become known for their highly personalized AI-driven consumer apps. In fact, most of the AI applications that have been widely adopted in China to date have been in consumer-facing industries, propelled by the world’s largest internet consumer base and the ability to engage with consumers in new ways to increase customer loyalty, revenue, and market valuations.

So what’s next for AI in China?   ..... '

Expanding Chinese Courier Robotics

Makes sense.   We need more to fulfill logistics. Note recognition of the need for collaboration.

Pandemic Pushes Chinese Tech Giants to Roll Out More Courier Robots  By Reuters

September 29, 2021

Chinese technology giants Alibaba, Meituan, and JD.com plan to increase their courier robot fleets fourfold to more than 2,000 by 2022, as the pandemic boosts demand for contactless services and the costs of manufacturing robots declines.   JD.com's Kong Qi said, "We want people and vehicles to work better together and not for vehicles to replace people. It is just the most boring section of the delivery guy's work that we will try to replace."

Alibaba currently operates over 200 robots and plans to have 1,000 in the field by March, and as many as 10,000 over the next three years.  JD.com operates about 200 robots, and plans add as many as 800 to its fleet by year’s end.

Meituan now has around 100 delivery robots in use.

From Reuters

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Quantum Computer Race in China

 Why and in what direction?

Competing Visions Underpin China’s Quantum Computer Race 

Alibaba builds their own qubits, Baidu remains quantum hardware-agnostic 

By  Craig S. Smith in Spectrum IEEE

China and the US are in a race to conquer quantum computing, which promises to unleash the potential of artificial intelligence and give the owner all-seeing, code-breaking powers.

But there is a race within China itself among companies trying to dominate the space, led by tech giants Alibaba and Baidu.

Like their competitors IBM, Google, Honeywell, and D-Wave, both Chinese companies profess to be developing "full stack" quantum businesses, offering access to quantum computing through the cloud coupled with their own suite of algorithms, software, and consulting services.

Alibaba is building solutions for specific kinds of hardware, as IBM, Google, and Honeywell are doing. (IBM's software stack will also support trapped ion hardware, but the company's focus is on supporting its superconducting quantum computers. Honeywell's software partner, Cambridge Quantum, is hardware agnostic, but the two companies' cooperation is focused on Honeyell's trapped ion computer.)

Baidu is different in that it is building a hardware-agnostic software stack that can plug into any quantum hardware, whether that hardware uses a superconducting substrate, nuclear magnetic resonance, or ion traps to control its qubits.

"Currently we don't do hardware directly, but develop the hardware interface," Runyao Duan, Baidu's head of quantum computing, told the 24th Annual Conference on Quantum Information Processing earlier this year. "This is a very flexible strategy and ensures that we will be open for all hardware providers."

Quantum computers calculate using the probability that an array of entangled quantum particles is in a particular state at any point in time. Maintaining and manipulating the fragile particles is itself a difficult problem that has yet to be solved at scale. Quantum computers today consist of fewer than 100 qubits, though hardware leader IBM has a goal of reaching 1,000 qubits by 2023.

But an equally thorny problem is how to use those qubits once they exist. "We can build a qubit. We can manipulate a qubit and we can read a qubit," said Mattia Fiorentini, head of machine learning and quantum algorithms at Cambridge Quantum in London. "The question is, how do you build software that can really benefit from all that information processing power?"

Scientists around the world are working on ways to program quantum computers that are useful and generalized and that engineers can use pretty much straight out of the box.

Of course, real large-scale quantum computing remains a relatively distant dream—currently quantum cloud services are primarily used for simulations of quantum computing using classical computers, although some are using small quantum systems—and so it's too early to say whether Baidu's strategy will pay off.

“We can build a qubit. We can read a qubit. But how do you build software that can really benefit from all that information processing power?"

In the past, Alibaba worked with the University of Science and Technology of China in Hefei, the capital of central China's Anhui province, which currently has the world's most advanced quantum computer, dubbed the Zuchongzhi 2.1, after China's famous fifth century astronomer who first calculated pi to six decimal places. The company is also building quantum computing hardware of its own.  ... ' 

China Rise in Smart-Cities

Are we too regulated, too cautious of uses of automation?  Interesting smart city stats. 

A Global Smart-City Competition Highlights China's Rise in AI,

By Wired, July 9, 2021  in ACM/Wired

Four years ago, organizers created the international AI City Challenge to spur the development of artificial intelligence for real-world scenarios like counting cars traveling through intersections or spotting accidents on freeways.

In the first years, teams representing American companies or universities took top spots in the competition. Last year, Chinese companies won three out of four competitions.

Last week, Chinese tech giants Alibaba and Baidu swept the AI City Challenge, beating competitors from nearly 40 nations. Chinese companies or universities took first and second place in all five categories. TikTok creator ByteDance took second place in a competition to identify car accidents or stalled vehicles from freeway videofeeds.

The results reflect years of investment by the Chinese government in smart cities. Hundreds of Chinese cities have pilot programs, and by some estimates, China has half of the world's smart cities. The spread of edge computing, cameras, and sensors using 5G wireless connections is expected to accelerate use of smart-city and surveillance technology.

From Wired

Alibaba Blockchain Patents

How much are patents driving this competition?

Alibaba on Track to Be the Largest Blockchain Patent Holder by End of 2020: Study
In Coindesk by Paddy Baker

 Alibaba is on track to supersede U.S. computer giant IBM as the single-largest holder of blockchain-related patents, according to a new study.

A report from intellectual property consultancy KISSPatent Thursday found the Chinese tech conglomerate was "definitely running the show," having already published ten times more blockchain patents than IBM, its nearest rival.

Should Alibaba continue at its current pace, the study predicted it would become the biggest patent holder in blockchain by the end of 2020.  .... "

Unilever and Alibaba

Followed Unilever for years,  an interesting direction for them in technology.

Latest Unilever Partnership to Focus on Next-Gen Digital Marketing
By Alarice Rajagopal - 07/07/2020 in ConsumerGoods

Unilever is partnering with the digital and technology intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group, Alibaba Cloud, on a strategic initiative that is expected to enable Unilever to action on next-generation digital marketing campaigns.

In the partnership, Unilever will be able to utilize Alibaba Cloud’s artificial intelligence (AI) and cloud-based technologies to optimize its omnichannel, online and offline demand generation activities. With intelligent analysis, Alibaba Cloud’s solutions can help to unlock detailed insights into Unilever’s customers buying patterns and behavior. The data-driven business intelligence could help Unilever accelerate the creation of new and precisely targeted digital marketing campaigns. It could also enable Unilever to predict more precisely and quickly respond to changing customer buying habits across multiple platforms. .... "

Alibaba Blockchain Domain Names

Note the similarity to the Cosmos Network.   A useful direction.

Alibaba Claims Patented Cross-Chain System Is Better Than Cosmos
Jun 1, 2020 at 15:00 UTC
Alibaba says its “unified domain name scheme” would simplify and improve communication between blockchains.

In a patent granted by the U.S. Patent Office last Tuesday, the e-commerce giant said its domain name system could enable cross-chain communications that are more simple and seamless than on existing interoperability solutions, specifically naming blockchain interoperability project Cosmos.

Alibaba says that assigning universally recognizable domain names to blockchains, or parts of a blockchain, could enable better identification and interaction with others in a broader network, in much the same way that entities recognize and communicate with one another using domain names, such as “.com” or “.org    .... "

See also:   https://cosmos.network/

Smart Speaker Stats

And much more stats at the link:

Amazon sold 10.4 million smart speakers in Q3 2019, three times more than Google’s 3.5 million devices  in Voicebot.AI

Alibaba lead Baidu in smart speaker sales in China with 3.9 to 3.7 million devices sold. Both companies sold more than Google during the quarter. Xiaomi was third in smart speaker sales in China for the second straight quarter.

Amazon Echo devices accounted for 36.6% of smart speakers sold worldwide up from 31.9% in Q3 2018 and up from 25.4% in Q2 2019.  .... " 

Interview with Alibaba Group Chairman and CEO

On innovation in analytics in particular, like the use of the term 'analytics' rather than always lapsing into AI.   AI is only one way to do and deliver analytics.

Speak softly, make tough decisions: An interview with Alibaba Group chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang.    The chairman and CEO of China’s e-commerce giant describes Alibaba’s approach to innovation and how he balances analytics and instinct to push himself to spot hidden opportunities.

Sent from McKinsey Insights 

Alibaba AI Chip

As expected, new chips to do learning and delivery of e-commerce and related AI tasks.   Note mention of 5G ... 

Alibaba unveils new AI chip aimed at speeding up e-commerce and cloud computing tasks in scmp.com

The chip’s launch comes amid a national drive by China to integrate emerging technologies such as AI and next generation 5G wireless networks into its economy  .... "

In China: Smile to Pay

Seeming to be expanding in China.   Payment here, but to what degree also product recognition and tallying?

Smile-to-Pay: Chinese Shoppers Turn to Facial Payment Technology  in the Guardian

China is embracing facial payment technology, which allows consumers to purchase goods simply by posing in front of point-of-sale (POS) machines equipped with cameras after linking an image of their face to a digital payment system or bank account. Similar facial recognition software is already widely used by the government to monitor citizens, although authorities have been criticized for using it to crack down on dissent. Despite concerns over data security and privacy, many consumers seem unfazed by facial payment technology. Alipay—the financial arm of Alibaba—already has facial payment devices in place in 100 Chinese cities. ... " 

China's Fast Move in Blockchain

Special edition of the MIT Tech Review Blockchain newsletter, which covers China, Ant Financial, Alibaba and new work in Smart Contracts ...   Sign on to this newsletter at the link, well worth following.

Chain   Chain Letter   

Blockchains, cryptocurrencies, and why they matter

05.03: Living on the lighted stage
Welcome to Chain Letter! This is a special edition that will highlight content from our third Business of Blockchain event. The event, which took place yesterday at the MIT Media Lab, was a collaboration between MIT Technology Review and the Media Lab’s Digital Currency Initiative. .... '

Alibaba Future Hotel

Somewhat unusual player in the hotel space. But will help test other AI related interactions.  Note recent indications that players in the hospitality space have decreased use of guest interacting robotics.

At Alibaba's Futuristic Hotel, Robots Deliver Towels and Mix Cocktails   Reuters  By Cate Cadell

A hotel that Chinese multinational conglomerate Alibaba opened in China last month utilizes robots and a suite of other high-tech tools that the company says drastically reduces the hotel's cost of human labor and eliminates the need for guests to interact with others. The 290-room "FlyZoo" hotel is an incubator for technology Alibaba wants to sell to the hotel industry in the future; it also serves as an opportunity to showcase Alibaba's proficiency in artificial intelligence (AI). FlyZoo's guests can check in via face scanners; visitors with a Chinese national ID can scan their faces using their smartphones for advance check-in. Projects like the hotel are designed to develop AI and other high-tech expertise to propel Alibaba's e-commerce revenue growth, and also foster new areas of business at a time when e-commerce revenue growth rates are slowing... "

New Retail is Here

Good piece in Forrester on Retail in China that sums up and charts progress in China

Future of Retail is Here   Xiaofeng Wang, Senior Analyst  Forrester

The future of retail is already here: Alibaba’s New Retail is reshaping the retail landscape in China and beyond. JD.com, Tencent, and traditional retailers like Starbucks and Walmart are all jumping on the bandwagon. My latest report, New Retail Is Transforming Commerce, shows retailers what they can learn from early adopters and how they can accelerate their omnichannel transformation.

eCommerce has tremendous momentum in China: As a percentage of total retail sales, online retail sales have risen from less than 2% in 2009 to nearly 25% in 2018. However, offline retail still takes the lion’s share and will remain the key growth engine for Alibaba and JD. As the first to recognize the trend, Alibaba responded with New Retail (a term coined by Jack Ma), its strategy to redefine commerce by blending online and offline ecosystems to create seamless customer experiences and improve retail efficiency. Alibaba’s New Retail models are transforming key retail sectors:... "

Alibaba has a Better Intelligent Assistant than Google's

In particular the claim that it is more conversationally powerful is interesting.  Such advances could lead to deeper interaction with humans and further engagement.

Alibaba already has a voice assistant way better than Google’s
It navigates interruptions and other tricky features of human conversation to field millions of requests a day   by Karen Hao  in Technology Review excerpt: 

In May, Google made quite the splash when it unveiled Duplex, its eerily humanlike voice assistant capable of making restaurant reservations and salon appointments. It seemed to mark a new milestone in speech generation and natural-language understanding, and it pulled back the curtain on what the future of human-AI interaction might look like.  Still only in Chinese. 

But while Google slowly rolls out the feature in a limited public launch, Alibaba’s own voice assistant has already been clocking overtime. On December 2 at the 2018 Neural Information Processing Systems conference, one of the largest annual gatherings for AI research, Alibaba demoed the AI customer service agent for its logistics company Cainiao. Jin Rong, the dean of Alibaba’s Machine Intelligence and Technology Lab, said the agent was already servicing millions of customer requests a day.

The demo call involved the agent asking a customer where he wanted his package delivered. In the back-and-forth exchange, the agent successfully navigated several conversational elements that demonstrated the breadth of its natural-language capabilities.

Take this exchange at the beginning of the call, translated from Mandarin: ... "

New Technology Enabling Alibaba to Sell $30.8 Billion

Impressive combination of tech being used to provide sales volume.   AI, Blockchain, Cloud,  Cooling, Supply Chain, Energy consumption  ...  So leading edge tech is not all hype, given the right problem.

" ... The technology enabling Alibaba to sell $30.8 billion in Double 11 goods ... From artificial intelligence to datacentre cooling, machine learning, and blockchain, Alibaba used new technology to surpass its record 11.11 Global Shopping Festival sales figure set last year by 45.3 billion yuan.  ... 

The Technology Enabling Alibaba to Sell $30.8B in Double 11 Goods
in ZDNet    by Asha McLean via CACM

Alibaba used artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and other technologies to rack up $30.8 billion in gross merchandise volume through its 24-hour Global Shopping Festival on November 11 (11/11, or “double eleven”). The company employed AI to enhance the shopping experience for buyers and sellers, and pushed the envelope of its cloud infrastructure to process a high volume of transactions. Alibaba optimized the performance of the global Internet data centers (IDCs) hosting its online stores with the DC Brain intelligent operating platform, which uses machine learning to forecast electrical consumption and power usage effectiveness for each IDC in real time, controlling each to lower overall energy consumption. Also used by Chinese shoppers was Mobile Taobao, a global tracking system app that uses the Internet of Things and blockchain to confirm products bought by consumers via dual authentication and two-way encryption. The app tracks the real-time location of items through location-based services and global positioning systems.  .... "

Alibaba and AI

More from China on their process

Why Alibaba is betting big on AI chips and quantum computing
Meet the man behind Alibaba’s gamble on emerging tech.   by Yiting Sun

During the opening ceremony of Alibaba’s 2018 computing conference last week, Simon Hu, president of Alibaba Cloud, invited the MC to taste some tea on the stage—but, first, to distinguish between tea roasted by hand and by machine.

While the MC stared helplessly at two saucers filled with nearly identical-looking tea leaves, Hu pulled out his smartphone. He took a photo of each saucer and fed them into an app developed by Tmall, one of Alibaba’s e-commerce platforms. Using an algorithm specially trained to tell the difference between different kinds of tea leave, the app solved the problem.

It was a small example of the interplay between Alibaba’s research on fundamental technologies and the demands of its business. Later on in the four-day conference, the company announced more plans to develop technologies that could be turned into useful things in everyday life, including an AI-chip subsidiary called Pingtou Ge and a team that’s developing a quantum processor.

The person leading all these research efforts is Jeff Zhang, Alibaba’s chief technology officer and head of its DAMO Academy research lab. Zhang sat down with MIT Technology Review at the event to discuss his company’s plans. ... "

Google to Deliver Assistant with a Screen

Google is bringing forward a speaker with a display capability to compete with Echo Show.    Google has the advantage of having the huge content supply called Youtube, while Amazon only have much lesser content to display without access to Youtube.    Have had a test Echo Show in place for some time,  and we have found the visual display to be largely useful in support, rather than as the key interface.  Like best the voice/sound/device interaction in both directions.  Note too the Asian competitors.  Good detail in article below:

Google to debut display-equipped AI speaker before holidays  In Asia Nikkei
Taiwan suppliers told to prepare for hardware blitz to challenge Amazon
CHENG TING-FANG and LAULY LI, Nikkei staff writers

TAIPEI -- Google is preparing to release a smart speaker equipped with a display for this year's holiday season, sources have told the Nikkei Asian Review, escalating the competition with rivals like Amazon.com and Alibaba Group Holding in the market for voice-activated gadgets.

The new product, which is likely to be similar to the Amazon Echo Show, would round out the Google Home range of smart speakers running the artificially intelligent Google Assistant, akin to Amazon's Alexa..... " 

Alibaba Looks at Shopping Experience with VR

Have been asked to take a closer look at this.   The extent to which it engages consumers,and the type of products being sold will be essential. Video at the link.

Alibaba Is Using AR To Change The Shopping Experience   by Bobby Carlton in VRScout

Alibaba is launching Taobao Buy, a new shopping experience that uses AR technology to bring 3D versions of products into the real world.

E-commerce supergiant, Alibaba Group, recently announced Taobao Buy, an AR infused shopping experience that reimagines how you shop online with an interactive experience that looks and feels futuristic, but is also easy to use.

Alibaba’s new AR infused shopping app perfectly blends the real-world with 3D images for a result that looks like something straight out of big budget science fiction movie.

To bring this experience to life, a 3,200-square-feet ‘futuristic shopping district’ will be assembled inside a building along scenic West Lake in Hangzhou, which is an area known for having influenced poets and painters throughout Chinese history, as well as being a location for reflecting an idealized fusion between humans and nature; something the designers behind Taobao Buy wanted to be sure to capture.  .... "

More on Kroger and Alibaba

More and expert comments on this.   Also notice the assistant augmented Tmall platform, testing for US application?  Large CPG's now getting private label competition from abroad in new markets?

Kroger teams with Alibaba to sell private labels to half-a-billion Chinese consumers
Who doesn’t want to access a billion-plus people who are much further along on the digital adoption journey than the U.S.?

by George Anderson in Retailwire

Kroger is looking to make its first overseas move a big one. America’s largest operator of supermarkets announced yesterday that it will test an online store selling its private label goods in China using Alibaba’s Tmall platform.

The pilot program will initially test sales of Kroger’s Simple Truth natural and organic private label. Last year, sales of Simple Truth products exceeded $2 billion, making it the largest natural and organic brand in the U.S., according to Kroger. Simple Truth is the second largest label in Kroger’s private brands portfolio. .... "