(Original title: Land-burst artificial intelligence: Industrial fund model favored by local governments)
Reporter Shen Junhan reports from Suzhou
Recently, reporters from the 21st Century Business Herald learned that the SIBI Artificial Intelligence Industry Fund led by Sibischi was formally established in May this year. The fund is 200 million yuan in size and focuses on early-stage projects in artificial intelligence. The main LPs include the Yuanxiao Chenkun Fund, the Suzhou Industrial Park's guidance fund, the Hong Kong Family Wealth Fund, the company's Stables, and the Internet of Things industry. Chain of capital and so on.
Founded in 2007, SBCI, headquartered in Suzhou, Jiangsu Province, is a head-starting company in the field of artificial intelligence in China. A report released by Gartner, an information consulting company in the first half of this year, showed that Spitzberg is one of the five most representative companies in the East Asian artificial intelligence field of the year.
According to the 21st Century Business Herald reporter, SBI is still not listed and is still in the stage of rapid development. Under this circumstance, why did Si Chih set up an industrial fund to start investing? Which segmentation areas are focused on by SBCI's own ventures, and which segmentation areas it wants to deploy through external investment?
SBI's internal focus and external investment
It is understood that SBCI's artificial intelligence industry fund is managed by an independent team. There are currently three partners Guo Haoran, Gao Shixing and Yang Xiaomin, and two investment managers. Guo Haoran has had entrepreneurial experience in software, sensors, and the Internet industry. After joining Bestinos, he was the vice president of strategy and responsible for the investment and financing of Sibichi. Gao Shixing also has rich entrepreneurial experience and is currently the CEO of Sibi. Yang Xiaomin is a founding partner of the original Venture Ventures and has more experience in investing.
"Combining the positioning of the company's own technology platform companies, we have been considering how to combine business and capital, how to optimize the capital structure, and how to combine internal capital with external capital." Guo Haoran reports to the 21st Century Business Herald Say.
He said that Scipch is a technology platform company that focuses on the NUI (Natural Interactive Interface) operating system and does not have much energy and ability to do downstream applications. Therefore, it is necessary to use the power of external capital to promote the maturity of the industrial chain.
SBB CEO Gao Sixing told reporters in a more general language that SBI is doing something: providing the Internet of Things with ears, mouth and brain so that the Internet of Things can listen, speak and think through humans. Natural language interaction helps users complete tasks.
“Although AI startups have opportunities and capital fever in different directions, the technology is generally similar. However, in the details of customers, markets, business models, and products, different entrepreneurial orientations will face different situations and competitors. We must maintain our focus on the Internet of Things field. Although we can see other vertical opportunities, we are more willing to give it to external entrepreneurial teams,†he told the 21st Century Business Herald reporter.
In fact, prior to the establishment of the industry fund, SB has already incubated several startup companies internally, including car radish and Xiansheng education. After the establishment of the industry fund, the benefits to Sibi include three aspects: First, the financial return; Second, the Si Chi can empower the company to be invested, so that their own tentacles extend to different areas; There is also an opportunity to acquire quality early projects.
According to Guo Haoran, the specific investment direction of the SBI Artificial Intelligence Industry Fund is mainly in three aspects. First, the application scenarios of the SBIBI NUI operating system, such as smart homes, robots, and mobile phone assistants.
"The second is the Internet of Things, we are very concerned about smart headphones, AR glasses and other things intelligent networking hardware. In fact, Apple's smart headset is a strategic product, it allows users to feel is not a peripheral part of the body, a strong sense of comfort. Apple's headset has a long standby time and can remember what the user said, emotions and emotions.†He said that the third block of industrial funds’ attention is the vertical application of NUI, such as education, medical care, and finance.
Local governments overweight support artificial intelligence industry
Gao Shixing believes that although many investment institutions have begun to use the field of artificial intelligence as the main track for investment layout this year, Sibic’s investments have unique advantages.
“In the face of the changes in the times brought about by artificial intelligence, many investors are indifferent to the iteration and landing of technology. We are seeing more than most investment agencies in terms of AI's technical direction, application direction, and direction of ecological change. And we know more about the core elements of competition and know what kind of team is needed to do things,†he said.
Guo Haoran stated that the industrial background also brought convenience to the fund screening project. “Sibichi has a certain amount of industry influence. Many companies that use artificial intelligence voice interaction technology will appear earlier in the vision of SIBICHI, so we can come into contact with such a team in the first time.â€
He believes that some listed companies in the industry set up industrial funds involved in artificial intelligence investment, a large part of the reason is to meet the needs of market value management, mainly financial investment and mergers and acquisitions. SB Artificial Intelligence Industry Fund is based on the future of the NUI industrial chain to do investment in catalytic innovation.
Compared with Beijing, Shanghai and other first-tier cities, Gao Shixing also sees the local advantages of developing artificial intelligence innovation in Suzhou. "First, the driving force of the artificial intelligence industry is technology, and the driving force is talent. Beijing and Shanghai recruit people relatively easily, but it is difficult to keep them. The high turnover rate of talents will allow companies to spend their energy on cultivating talents. Moreover, the organizational structure of startup companies is not As a large company like a radish and a pit, a person in the entrepreneurial team is gone. It may not be a piece of mud but a piece of land.†he said.
Gao Shixing believes that Suzhou is relatively unimpressive and has a low turnover rate. From the project of the previous 1,000 person plan venture competition, it can also be seen that the entrepreneurial team in Suzhou will be more stable and suitable for the development of research and development enterprises.
Second, in the past, the artificial intelligence industry in Suzhou was relatively weak. This weakness has caused the attention of local governments and brought many opportunities. The Action Plan for the Development of Artificial Intelligence Industry in Suzhou Industrial Park (2017-2020) released in March this year shows that the park plans to build more than five artificial intelligence-related feature industrial parks, incubation bases, and innovation platforms by 2020, setting up a scale of RMB 10 billion. The artificial intelligence industry development fund strives to nurture 2-3 billion-level, 1-2 billion-level artificial intelligence leading enterprises.
In order to achieve the goals of the plan, local governments have introduced preferential policies in talent introduction and technical enterprise support. In the Institute of Artificial Intelligence recently established by SBCI in collaboration with Shanghai Jiaotong University, the local government of Suzhou has also invested large sums of money and resources.
"After we get the park's guidance fund, we will invest a certain percentage of local projects. Local governments often give us recommendations. We plan to build a supporting ecosystem and industry around Suzhou." said Guo Haoran.
Apart from Suzhou, there are still many local governments that are generously supporting the development of the local artificial intelligence industry. For example, at the 2017 Guangzhou Artificial Intelligence Roundtable held on May 23, Cai Chaolin, deputy mayor of Guangzhou and secretary of the Nansha District Party Committee, announced a series of policies and measures to support the development of the artificial intelligence industry in Guangzhou and Nansha District. Specifically, the “Guangzhou Artificial Intelligence Industry Fund†with a scale of 10 billion yuan was established, and a 3,000-mu “Nansha Artificial Intelligence Industrial Park†was established in the Qingsheng Free Trade Zone to support the establishment of the Guangzhou Nansha International Advanced Artificial Intelligence Industry Research Institute. . (Editor Lin Kun)
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