China Economic Development: Chongqing seeks transformation via digital technologies

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The southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing is one of the nation's fastest-growing cities. It used to rely largely on traditional manufacturing, like auto making, for development. But now the city seeks economic transformation through digital technologies. CGTN's Yang Jinghao has more.

YANG JINGHAO CHONGQING "Imagine I'm catching a flight with the facial recognition system, I just check in within seconds. With this service, I can easily get my flight information from this screen."

This intelligent system has been installed in scores of airports across China. It is developed by CloudWalk, a leading facial recognition software developer with its largest R&D center in Chongqing.

WANG FAHANG DEPUTY HEAD, AI RESEARCH INSTITUTE, CLOUDWALK "Through our solutions integrating artificial intelligence, cognitive computing, big data and other technologies, apart from aviation, we also specialize in finance, public security and retail."

Established in 2015, the unicorn company has seen fast growth in recent years, responding to Chongqing's blueprint for seeking transformation via the digital economy.

Under the local government's strong determination, small and micro businesses also usher in good development opportunities. In mid-June, cloud computing giant Alibaba Cloud launched an innovation center in the city, and they plan to incubate more than 100 firms involved in various cutting-edge technologies.

CAO LING, PRESIDENT OPERATOR OF ALI CLOUD INNOVATION CENTER, CHONGQING "Under the current entrepreneurial environment, each start-up eager to succeed has to join a large 'ecosystem'. If a company has a good business model and can well match the new strategy of Alibaba, it will absolutely acquire various resources from us."

Carloha is one of the first companies that has settled in the center. The New York-based used car e-commerce service provider just relocated its R&D center to this fast-growing city to tap into its potential.

LIANG LONG CEO OF CARLOHA "In my opinion, Chongqing is a new city for Internet, and has much more potential. The environment, people and the support from the government are all good."

As more tech firms cluster here, Chongqing's traditional pillar industries like auto making and electronics will be empowered with greater growth impetus, and the whole city is expected to go smarter. And this is what the enterprises are devoted to.

WANG FAHANG DEPUTY HEAD, AI RESEARCH INSTITUTE, CLOUDWALK "Next, we plan to create an ecosphere together with our upstream and downstream partners. On one hand, we can jointly establish laboratories or companies in Chongqing with government departments. Meanwhile, we can attract intelligent hardware companies to the city."

Now, Chongqing has also gathered a batch of data centers specializing in data storage, processing and distribution. They will serve as a firm base for the only municipality in Western China to rise as a digital economy powerhouse. YJH, CGTN, Chongqing.