Foreign media said China announced a plan in July last year, hoping to become a global leader in artificial intelligence. For technical experts in the United States engaged in artificial intelligence, this document is a direct challenge to the leadership of the United States in the decades to come that may be the most important technical research area.

The Australian Financial Review reported on February 21 that the declaration is very similar to several reports on the future of artificial intelligence released by the Obama administration at the end of 2016. "It's worth noting that artificial intelligence has become the top priority of China's leadership and that everything has started rapidly," said Elsa Khania, associate fellow at the new U.S. Security Center.

It was reported that China seemed to be mimicking the Obama era road map but six months later, artificial intelligence experts in the U.S. industry and academia said that the White House led by Trump has done little to insist on the last government defending the economy Appeal.

According to the Russian satellite news agency reported on February 21, China will leave the United States behind in the next few years and become the undisputed leader in the field of artificial intelligence. This prediction is convincing because the Chinese government has formulated a development plan in the field of artificial intelligence. Last July, the Chinese government announced "a new generation of artificial intelligence development plan."

The problem lies not only with state support. Both China and the United States have objective competitive advantages. For example, the United States is undoubtedly a pioneer in the field of artificial intelligence, and the country has established a strong scientific research base. But China has the other most important advantages: the world's largest domestic market. It works like this: the more data you upload, the smarter it is. In this sense, no country can provide more powerful data retrieval than China. First of all, China has a large population. More than half of the population is 752 million, all of whom are Internet users. 84% of Internet users regularly use mobile payments. In this way, people have left a "digital trail" in their daily lives, which happens to be "big data" that is extremely important for machine training.

Second, in the field of artificial intelligence research in China, three technology companies dominate: Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent Group. In this way, China will also have another competitive advantage: a wide range of effects. Technology giants rely on the scale of their activities and can immediately introduce new achievements in artificial intelligence research and development into a variety of activity areas, products and services.

Finally, there is another important factor: China spared no expense in recruiting talents and scholars from all over the world. If a few years ago California became the center of attraction for talented people around the world, more and more high-level professionals are now looking for opportunities in China.

In addition, according to the Financial Times website on February 20, China has won a first place in the battle to become the overlord in the field of artificial intelligence - surpassing the United States in the investment in artificial intelligence start-ups. This is a huge leap forward. Last year, half of the global investment in artificial intelligence start-ups went to China, compared with only 11.3% in 2016.

According to CB Ventures, the United States still leads the world in the number and total equity of AI start-ups, though its share is declining.