China has always been deemed one of the most powerful and central countries in terms of production and trade. However, as of two to three years ago--the startup and entrepreneurial scene has stepped foot into China and appears to be blossoming into a whole different sphere of business, in comparison to Western structure. So why the sudden change? Economic growth, inspiring and powerful new Chinese companies, and boosts from the Chinese government might be a start.
Vastly evolving specifically in Chengdu, the capital of China's Sichuan province--Chengdu, is considered “the beginning city” of the southern silk road which connects Europe to Asia, and it’s reputation within China remains as “the city of innovation.” So, when Dashmote was invited to the Global Business Incubation Summit & the Global Innovation and Entrepreneurship Fair held in Chengdu last week, it was a great honour to be surrounded by so many industry experts, successful entrepreneurs, and business executives.
Dennis Tan, our CEO, as well as myself had the privilege of presenting solutions offered by Dashmote and it’s view on entrepreneurship and it’s various ecosystems. I want to overview the event in this article and explain some noticeable differences in the Chinese entrepreneurial sphere.
The Global Business Incubation Summit was offered by SBC, Startupbootcamp-- “a global family of industry-focused accelerators.” With a global entrepreneurial team of over 40 people from around 10 different countries, 200+ professional guests in the industry, and an overall audience of over 700 professional attendees; the theme presented was “global change in the business incubator”.
SBC founder Carsten Kølbek delivered a keynote speech: "The focus of business incubation will no longer be the incubator and the creation of space, but the accelerator. Accelerator focus on the entrepreneurial team deeper and more rigorous training and optimization to help enterprises faster and more stable growth and development" - Carsten Kølbek
With Great Keynote speakers as: Liu Qingfeng, Founder of iFlyTek, Stas Gayshan, Managing Director at Cambridge Innovation Center and Wang Gang, Minister of Science and Technology and many others; the various parties in the ecosystem exchanged ideas on how innovation and entrepreneurship resources can be best matched at home and abroad. Dashmote--as well as HiHedge, Boundlss, Spendolater and Otonomos presented the latest projects to the guests, to showcase the SBC accelerated results.
Technology and concepts of A.I. and robotics are becoming increasingly more valuable and dominant in the Chinese mobile and media ecosystem. In fact, China is the strongest A.I. country in the world. One of the speeches from the summit, given by IflyTek explained that there are three stages of A.I. and as of 2016, we are currently between stages two and three. These include: machine learning, machine intelligence and machine consciousness. Iflytek uses reinforcement learning through voice recognition software which transforms words into voice. Although voice recognition as a concept has been around for some time now, it has now advanced to a level of sentence interpretation--rather than word by word. The future of Voice Recognition is to talk with emotions, and interchangeable tones, imitating the different styles of translation. This innovation can make sure that there is no need for translation and allows for utilisation both in cars and at home. AI is slowly spreading throughout our entire society and can influence and be integrated into every sector through three requisites: core technology, big data, and industry experts (fusion).
In fact, new and small businesses and startups are extremely significant not only in the Chinese sector; but also globally. Startups account for nearly all net new job creation and almost 20 percent of gross job creation within the United States. Companies less than one year old have created an average of 1.5 million jobs per year over the past three decades. These entrepreneurial endeavors and startups are also supported amongst China--however, only when conducted with a clear vision and expertise.
Qianwen (Queena) Ai, a Marketing Specialist at CUBIC Inc. said at the summit: “Entrepreneurship is supported all over China by all parties. The issue I find is that young entrepreneurs are starting a business without really thinking about what it means and why you should do it. They are pushed by the trend and hype. Many graduates don’t want to apply for regular jobs but actually have no clue what or how they plan to start a business.” It was quite enlightening to hear the thoughts and various knowledge of the different businesses, speakers and industry experts in regards to changes in the field, the future of innovation, and Chinese mentality in terms of entrepreneurship.
Attending the Global Business Incubation Summit was tremendously rewarding and informative and it was a great honour to represent Dashmote there. I’m eager to initiate a deal coinciding with the Chinese entrepreneurial sphere and very enthusiastic about China’s plans for attracting global capital and future of business and innovation products, and building an international entrepreneurial ecology.