AI tech hub shifts East: A new growth engine emerges

Editor's note: Tian Feng is the former dean of Chinese AI software giant SenseTime's Intelligence Industry Research Institute. The article reflects the authors' opinions and not necessarily the views of CGTN.

As the global center of technological innovation shifts eastward, China is emerging as a key driver of artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced robotics. With a vast pool of scientific talent and a thriving industrial ecosystem, the country is rapidly transforming new quality productive forces into real-world applications. From the viral rise of AI assistant DeepSeek to breakthroughs in humanoid and quadruped robotics, China's technological momentum is reshaping industries and everyday life. This article explores how the nation is forging ahead in AI-driven innovation and solidifying its position as a global tech powerhouse.

Emergence of new quality productive forces: Global innovation hub migrates eastward

Throughout modern history, there have been five major transnational and regional shifts in the global center of science and technology innovation. Each new wave of productivity has attracted massive flows of global innovation resources.

During the Renaissance (16th-17th centuries), China's Four Great Inventions – paper-making, the compass, gunpowder, and printing – spread to Europe via the Silk Road, sparking the development of human-powered mechanical productivity in Italy and establishing it as the global innovation hub. By the mid-18th century, Britain pioneered the Industrial Revolution with engineering innovations like the spinning jenny, Watt's steam engine, and coke smelting.

In the late 18th to early 19th centuries, France established the world's first university-based engineering education system, drastically boosting steel production by a factor of 10 or more through engineering breakthroughs. Germany later introduced a research-oriented graduate education system that integrates theory with practice, becoming a global center in fundamental physics. The Second Industrial Revolution (late 19th-early 20th centuries) saw the U.S. rise as the innovation hub, with inventions like Ford's assembly line and Silicon Valley's semiconductor industry.

Entering the 21st century, as developed economies face industrial hollowing-out, Asia's new-style industrialization has accelerated, with rising R&D investment and systematic eastward migration of global high-end innovation elements. Hardtech industrial chains and Asian tech talent are converging on China's Yangtze River Delta, Pearl River Delta, and Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei urban agglomeration, evolving into world-class hardtech innovation hubs.

According to China Science and Technology Talent Development Report (2022), China had over 110 million science and technology professionals by 2020, making it the world's largest and most comprehensive talent pool. The global flow of young tech talent dictates where new generations of scientific innovation hubs will emerge.

DeepSeek goes viral, new quality productive forces soar into everyday life

Affordable and user-friendly AI tools constitute new quality productive forces. Elementary school students across China have been consulting DeepSeek for homework help, while parents and grandparents in cities and rural areas have always been chattering in their dialects, "Just ask DeepSeek when you encounter problems at work or in life – it's free!"

Billions of ordinary citizens mastered this "magic spell" for AI assistance, while hundreds of central state-owned enterprises and leading private enterprises rapidly adopted DeepSeek in various scenarios such as overseas marketing, customer service, data analysis, manufacturing, financial risk control, and office writing.

On January 27, 2025, the DeepSeek R1 app simultaneously topped both the Chinese and U.S. free app charts on Apple's App Store, surpassing ChatGPT to become the global No.1 on both lists. It reached 100 million users in just 14 days – nearly four times faster than ChatGPT's 61 days. Just eight days after the Spring Festival holiday, Global Times announced that China's generative AI user base had surpassed 250 million. Such a broad "popular base" for AI is truly astonishing.

Chinese robots take strides: AI labor force enters every industry

As large language models represented by DeepSeek provide knowledge services for millions in China, embodied intelligence represented by Unitree Robotics, DEEP Robotics, and BrainCo is leading the way globally in serving thousands of industries. Unitree's humanoid robot, which has a single-joint cost of only 24 percent that of Tesla's Optimus, has become the first full-size general humanoid robot in China capable of autonomous walking and running on complex terrain. It lays a solid foundation for entering China's intelligent manufacturing factories to perform tasks such as heavy lifting and screw tightening by equipping itself with 3D LiDAR and depth cameras to perceive and scan high-precision production environment data in real-time.

Unitree's quadruped robots (robot dogs) have been deployed for 24-hour inspection and maintenance in complex environments such as power grids, substations, urban underground pipelines, factories, industrial parks, and disaster zones. They can also replace firefighters in rapidly changing fire scenes to conduct reconnaissance, emergency response, and rescue operations. These robots provide timely decision-making support for disaster relief by delivering first-hand information, detecting vital signs through infrared sensors, and creating real-time virtual models of disaster scenes. They are also capable of traversing hazardous environments to deliver rescue supplies to firefighters. Singapore's power system inspection has adopted DEEP Robotics' X30 quadruped robot, marking a milestone for Chinese robots entering the international power sector.

Behind the rapid innovation of China's core AI technology lie multifaceted drivers. First, China's disruptive innovation policies have cultivated a highly conducive environment, attracting a steady influx of both overseas and domestic tech talents. Financial investments, which prioritize early-stage, small-scale, and technology-focused projects as well as large-scale, industry-strengthening initiatives, have meticulously incubated and nurtured these innovations. Additionally, China's manufacturing sector is underpinned by a comprehensive production capacity spanning 31 major, 179 medium, and 609 minor categories.

On the other hand, Chinese engineers are earning only one-third of their Silicon Valley counterparts yet demonstrating relentless dedication and achieving remarkable milestones.

"If foreigners can achieve it, why can't we? Are we Chinese inherently inferior?" Qian Xuesen, a pioneer of China's "Two Bombs, One Satellite" program, said 70 years ago.

Seventy years later, Liang Wenfeng, the founder of DeepSeek, boldly asserts that China must evolve from a follower to a contributor in technology and stand at the forefront of innovation.