The founder and CEO of Huawei Technologies has been putting out the word that the company will focus on the industrial use of artificial intelligence (AI) technology in coming years, instead of following in the footsteps of Baidu and Alibaba and investing heavily in chatbots.
A detailed sample of his thinking came February 24 when Ren Zhengfei addressed students in a forum at the Shanghai Jiaotong University’s Advanced Industrial Technology Research Institute.
In the future, he said, 98% of AI applications from the giant Shenzhen-based telecommunication equipment maker will serve industrial and agricultural needs while only 2% will serve consumers directly. Because of this, Huawei will not put a great deal of effort into the development of ChapGPT-like applications, he said.
On the same occasion, Ren said the company will set up a cloud-based system-simulation laboratory in Russia’s Saint Petersburg and connect it with its cloud hub in Guizhou. He said Chinese academics will be provided free computing resources to do their experiments.
In an opening speech, Ren commented on the US sanctions. Asia Times provides the following partial translation:
When I was young, I admired the West very much because Western science and technology were so advanced. After founding Huawei, I remained pro-Western. At that time, we put forward a slogan: “Use the best parts and tools in the world to build the best products in the world.” And we achieved it.
But, then, we were sanctioned. People could not sell us parts and tools. We were stuck, as the best components in the world mostly come from the US.
In fact, I still don’t oppose the US. If we want to become the most advanced, we must learn from the advanced.
The soft power of the US in science and education will remain beyond our reach for decades. Over the past centuries, the innovative soil of the US has not degraded.
Fortunately, we’ve spent nearly 20 years to make preparations in basic theory and invested hundreds of billions of renminbi to train a group of scientists and technical experts.
In the past three years, we have replaced more than 13,000 foreign parts with Chinese ones and redeveloped more than 4,000 integrated circuit boards. Now the manufacturing of our integrated circuit boards has been stabilized.
In April, we will launch MetaERP [an enterprise resource planning software product], which is built with our own operating system, database, compiler and language. [The system was launched on April 20.]
We have been gradually overcoming the embarrassing supply interruption.
In the past, we used to partner with Western universities for our research projects. We have started partnering with more Chinese universities.
Ren also answered some questions from the floor.
Q (Student): What’s your view about the development of AI chatbots?
A (Ren Zhengfei): In the future, the direct contribution of AI platforms to human society may be less than 2% while 98% will serve the industrial and agricultural society. And AI services also rely on 5G technology.
The reason why Germany is so supportive of Huawei’s 5G is because it wants to upgrade its industry with AI.
In China, a plant of Xiangtan Iron and Steel Group has unmanned processes from steelmaking to rolling. Tianjin Port has also achieved unmanned loading and unloading of goods. With 5G+ AI technology, a coal mine in Shanxi province reduced the number of its underground workers by 60-70%. Most staff are now wearing suits in the control room.
We will pay attention to the AI applications that serve the industrial and agricultural society. But we will only develop the underlying computing platform, not the applications.
Q: The use of commercial databases in experiments may have privacy issues. What’s your view?
A: We have a project that targets management of tens of millions of servers with a single operating system. I’ve allowed the project’s team members, mostly young people, to brainstorm and explore. They have now made a system that can manage hundreds of thousands of servers.
Our algorithms aim at reducing the frictions of high data traffic. We only provide a “black soil” underlying platform and do not develop apps for customers, who owe the data and have the ability to understand it.
In the future, we will start some projects unrelated to Huawei’s businesses, just like what Google is doing. But right now, we do not have the money. When we have more profit, we will contribute more to scientific research.
Q: A lot of mathematicians have recently joined Huawei. What’s the company’s plan?
A: In the future, mathematics will become increasingly important. AI is all about algorithms, which are mathematics.
We will set up a [high data traffic] system simulation laboratory in Saint Petersburg, which has a lot of excellent mathematicians and physicists.
The lab will be like a “digital wind tunnel” where we can have systems modeling, analysis, simulation, testing and optimization to accelerate our research and development.
We will also set up a mirror laboratory in our cloud data center in Gui’an.
You (Chinese academics) can do experiments here across different topics, such as wireless, network, computing, digital energy, supply, manufacturing and materials.
When doing large-scale model experiments, you can simulate the scene, instead of using an actual scene of a customer (a commercial company). You can come and do your experiments, take away your achievements and publish them in your papers and books.
You don’t need to acknowledge our staff as they have already been paid. We will read and digest your papers and try to commercialize your scientific achievements.
Read: Huawei seeks ‘China solution’ for global green ports
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