West Bund branch of WAIC to highlight AI and art
The West Bund Art Center where the 2018 WAIC was held.
The West Bund branch of the World Artificial Intelligence Conference, scheduled the end of August, will feature the latest AI applications, forums among leading global scientists and art exhibitions.
The Xuhui session on the Huangpu River waterfront where the first WAIC was held in 2018 will be held between August 29 and 31 at the West Bund Art Center and TANK Shanghai museum.
Three forums, three AI exhibitions and four other events have been planned for the Puxi session of the conference. The main site for the event will be at the Expo Center in the Pudong New Area.
The Global AI in Healthcare Summit will be held on August 30. Over 100 scientists and industry leaders have confirmed to attendance. Speakers will include members of the research team of Nobel Laureate Tu Youyou.
Tencent, Alibaba and Huawei will host exhibitions at the art center and the former aviation fuel tanks through October.
Tencent will present a T-Day exhibition featuring time travel and space rotation with AI technology. The history of the city’s Yuyuan Garden and shikumen, will be shown through AI. Visitors will be able to watch classic movies in the Grand Theater and fireworks over the Lujiazui financial hub.
Alibaba will create an A Museum where fairytales will come true with the help of AI, while Huawei will showcase remote medical rescues, robotic surgery and communication technology.
A preparatory meeting for the 2019 WAIC is held at the West Bund Museum on Friday.
The “Universe of Water Particles in the Tank” by teamLab in Tank Shanghai.
AI plus art
Alongside the conference, there will be an e-sports contest, and various tech-related art exhibitions will be held in the nearby art galleries and museums.
Tank Shanghai, housed in five thick steel aviation fuel tanks, is presenting an exhibition on the “Universe of Water Particles in the Tank.” Waterfalls projected onto the walls inside the tank will be obstructed when visitors stand in front of them, according to teamLab, in charge of the exhibition.
The site was built in 1917 to supply fuel to nearby Longhua Airport. Five oil tanks, a fire pool and docks have been preserved as reminders of times past. The site covers 60,000 square meters, a sixth of which are indoors.
Xuhui houses a third of the city’s key AI companies, including Tencent, Netease, Xiaomi, Microsoft and Amazon. The AI industry scale has reached 15.8 billion yuan (US$2.24 billion) in Xuhui, a 30.5 percent increase on year, said Fang Shizhong, the director of the district.
Xuhui has released it "T-plan" to further support the development of AI firms and attract more to the district. The T-plan include the city’s first AI Town in Beiyang area along the Dianpu River and the city’s Outer Ring Road along with a 200-meter landmark AI Tower, which has been completed on Longyao Road in the West Bund to become a global AI development and exhibition center.
This year’s WAIC will be held between August 29 and August 31, with more than 300 company exhibitors and 300 speakers.
It’s expected to attract 200,000 visitors including 70,000 professionals. More than half of the 300 speakers will come from overseas.
United Nations’ officials, executives including Elon Musk from Tesla and academics including Turing Award winners will attend various forums. They will talk about AI chips, 5G, smart driving, smart city and AI integration in sectors such as education and urban management, according to the Shanghai Commission of Economy and Information Development, the local industry regulator and a major organizer of the WAIC.
Last year, a total of 170,000 people from over 40 countries attended the 2018 WAIC, which helped to enhance the popularity of Xuhui and West Bund in the global AI sector, Fang said.
