Meet US cutting-edge products at China's import expo

Want a fancy life? Then you cannot miss the cutting-edge products brought by US firms to the ongoing second China International Import Expo.

With plant-based ice creams, ultra-light suitcases and expandable walls that fold up to the size of a book, US chemical giant DuPont is showcasing its most eye-catching and innovative commodities at this year's massive import expo that opened Tuesday in Shanghai.

"We unveiled lots of products for the first time in China at the CIIE, a larger and higher-profile platform, through which we can not only present our goods but also demonstrate our future investment and decision plans," said Yi Zhang, DuPont president of Greater China.

According to him, DuPont has completed the upgrading of its innovation center in Shanghai. "China has a growing demand for high-quality products, pushing us to increase our research and development efforts to meet the needs of the Chinese market."

Including DuPont, a total of 192 US companies take up a total exhibition area of around 47,500 square meters at this year's event, the largest exhibition area among all participating countries.

From food and clothing to vehicles and aircraft, visitors can find almost everything from US enterprises, which are hoping to grab a bigger slice of the Chinese market and strike more deals at the expo.

Big-name US firms such as Microsoft, Google and Qualcomm have set up highly interactive booths to make their cutting-edge technologies more accessible to visitors.

Wearing an on-device virtual reality headset, visitors can experience Qualcomm's smart virtual reality technology, which can adjust views accurately according to the users' body movements.

Royal Caribbean Cruises, one of the world's largest cruise liners, also came to the expo to demonstrate its high-quality services.

"We introduced a series of world-class cruise facilities to China with the support of the country's opening-up policies and governments at different levels," said Liu Zinan, Chairman, Royal Caribbean Cruises Asia.

The company announced during the expo that it would deploy "Wonder of the Seas," one of the world's largest cruise ships, in Shanghai in 2021, which will be equipped with vast swimming pools, water parks, bars with robot bartenders, gourmet food and theater shows.

China's cruise market has witnessed explosive growth in the past decade, becoming the second-largest in the world after the United States, according to Liu.

Boeing has gone a step further to entertain its audience, providing visitors the experience of being a pilot.

"They can try operating a flight deck demonstrator at our booth," said Sherry Carbary, Boeing China president.

"We are delighted to attend the expo again this year with a larger booth and more varied exhibited products," she said.

After doodling on a screen, visitors can design their favorite patterns on an aircraft and print them as postcards at the booth.

"For Boeing, the expo is a great opportunity to showcase our products and have exchanges with people from around the world," she said.

During the expo, Boeing also announced that it would launch an education project at Tsinghua University High School with the aim to cultivate students interested in aviation.

As a leader in the global food and agriculture industry, Cargill expects to sign agreements of more than US$3.1 billion for products including beef, poultry, grain, vegetable oils and iron ore at the expo.

"Cargill is pleased to participate in the CIIE, which provides unique opportunities to strengthen economic cooperation and bolster mutually beneficial trade in the Chinese market," said David MacLennan, Cargill chairman and CEO.