In this time’s Sci-Tech Innovation Executive Interview of CTO Think Tank research department, we interviewed Mr. Wei Hongfeng, CEO and chief scientist of IntelliCloud Technologies Co., Ltd. On January 12th, 2022, “CTO executive education and digital intelligence innovation demonstration base of artificial intelligence industry” jointly constructed by Shanghai International School of Chief Technology Officer of East China Normal University (hereinafter referred to as CTO school) and IntelliCloud Technologies Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as IntelliCloud) was officially unveiled. Mr. Wei Hongfeng was employed as an industrial mentor by CTO School.
As a highly innovative AI technology company, IntelliCloud has won many awards in the research and innovation of AI algorithm in recent years. In November 2021, IntelliCloud won the championship of two international top VOT competitions. In December, it participated in the 18th China International Social Public Security Expo for the first time, displaying its application results in multiple security scenarios. What has promoted the rapid progress of IntelliCloud and led to its achievements? What kind of development plan does IntelliCloud have for the future? How does president Wei view the current AI industry environment in China? Let’s enter the sci-tech innovation executive interview to learn more about IntelliCloud.
1. Find the Right Position and Promote Development with Opportunities and Technology
As early as 2014, Mr. Wei Hongfeng started to lead his team to conduct social science research on social media, mainly focusing on Facebook and Instagram in the market abroad and QQ in Chinese market. As is acknowledged, photos, videos and texts are the most common information on social platforms. The team classified and processed these types of data and made corresponding analysis. Due to the huge amount of data, they developed several tools to assist the researches. With the progress of the researches, the team had gradually entered the field of in-depth learning, which led them to be the first batch of pioneers in in-depth learning of China.
While the research went smoothly, President Wei’s team also conducted a series of commercial tests in some emerging fields such as facial recognition. After clearly realizing that AI can bring changes and progress to China, especially China’s traditional industries, IntelliCloud was officially established in 2018. In the early stage of the development of domestic AI industry, most enterprises have similar strength and advantages. Most of the needs met by IntelliCloud in the early stage came from traditional industries such as agriculture, animal husbandry and construction. “Our goal is to use AI to serve the digitization of traditional industries.” President Wei mentioned, “at that time, several enterprises had invested a lot in informatization, as a result, IntelliCloud chose a field that is not focused on by the competitors and embarked on the development path of informatization + intellectualization.
Due to the privacy and confidentiality of data, it may be difficult for start-ups to obtain the opportunity to cooperate with large enterprises or the government, while IntelliCloud has well seized the opportunity to successfully cooperate with state-owned enterprises such as China State Construction Engineering Corporation (CSCEC) and China National Building Material Group Co., Ltd. with its excellent technology. “The technology of IntelliCloud is relatively mature and advanced, but opportunities are equally important to us.” When IntelliCloud entered the market in 2019, it just caught up with the trend that a huge amount of enterprises in different industries are in the process of digitization. Therefore, the company can contact and try to cooperate with large enterprises in any industry. After more than a year of contacting and numerous tests, after the epidemic was basically controlled in 2020, the production of IntelliCloud was finally on track and it has successfully signed contracts with many leading enterprises of a variety of industries. Additionally, its various products in the field of public utilities such as high-speed railway security were gradually approved by the industry as well. President Wei admitted that Good opportunities, suitable industries, technical advantages, and excellent talents are all essential elements needed for success, and none of them can be lacking. Nonetheless, for the AI industry, there are many opportunities, consequently, technical ability has become a decisive factor for success.
“Proper positioning is also a necessary factor for success. Especially in the AI industry, the competition is fierce. Whether we can stand out in many excellent enterprises depends on whether we could precisely find our own position.” President Wei mentioned that although there is a cooperative relationship between enterprises and customers, it is extremely unfavorable to let customers provide huge investment and see no returns. “Government projects mainly focus on social benefits and political values, while enterprises may pay more attention to the industrialization of investment and the long-term development values.” IntelliCloud has a clear understanding and positioning of itself and the industry. “For the industry market of B2B, it is impossible for the enterprise to expand suddenly. Positioning and providing high-quality service to customers should be laid the most importance on so as to succeed in the industry.
It goes beyond dispute that the development of IntelliCloud is not plain sailing, this is mainly because the track targeted by it is relatively novel, and there are not yet many cases and enterprises to learn from in the field. “Our customers are rather tolerant, with mutual help, they are willing to explore this direction together with us.” The long cycle is not a problem, while the real problem is whether the technologies can be presented to and accepted by customers and produce benefits for them. And it can be said that IntelliCloud is very successful in this regard.
2. Gradually and Steadily, Transformation is Approved in the Competition
“Technology driven is the initial development path of most science and innovation companies, but after a period of time, it is inevitable to change to market and demand driven.” No matter how excellent the technology is, if there is no customer to pay for it and it is not approved by the market, it will not help the development of the enterprise at all. “We have encountered many obstacles, for example once when our technology was far better than that of our competitors, it was one of the other enterprises that finally won the bid.” It is precisely because of these experiences and keen insight into the market that after reflection, IntelliCloud is very decisive in the transformation, more in line with the needs of customers, and tries to create its own technical standards, so as to improve its competitiveness.
As a science and technology innovation enterprise, IntelliCloud has a rather small scale, it currently has more than 100 employees. “The market is not friendly to small businesses.” Due to the guidance of government policies and the monopoly of large enterprises on the industry, the development of small and micro enterprises is still difficult. “Nonetheless, although large enterprises occupy a lot of resources, the effect of their projects is not necessarily ideal.” In addition, due to the existence of scale effect and brand effect of large enterprises, it is convenient for them to higher their service price, so as to higher the income with a low cost, which squeezes the living space of small enterprises. The fact that many small enterprises are not developing smoothly is not because their products or technologies are not good enough, but more because they lack the right to speak and influence in the market.” This is also one of the main challenges faced by IntelliCloud.
At present, there is no pressure for enterprises to expand to a large scale. Nevertheless, we hope to develop more solidly and deeply in the industry, sometimes large-scale expansion will bring negative effects. President Wei is well aware of this truth, therefore, he chose a more stable development mode. “Being listed is the starting point, not the end point. If you are not ready, it doesn’t make much sense to rush to be listed. Countless cases indicated that meaningless expansion is likely to cause the collapse of the whole company.” As a result, President Wei stressed that the current goal is to “be more down-to-earth”. For a long time, IntelliCloud has its own development plan and rhythm, and that is also why President Wei is so calm when it comes to being listed.
3. Cultural and Technical cultivation of Talents
At a time of fierce competition in the industry and frequent malicious poaching, it is not easy for IntelliCloud to have a stable and excellent R&D team. In this regard, Mr. Wei believes that when the R&D talents have strong willingness to pursue the development of technology, and are supported properly, once there is a problem solved, they will experience a strong sense of achievement. Additionally, President Wei also mentioned, the sense of achievement is on the one hand, on the other hand, the reason why we can attract so many talents is that our technical direction has been approved by most people and we can establish certain technical barriers. In addition to the staffs, IntelliCloud also has a strong core team, including some highly professional professors, such as President Wei, who is also a visiting professor at University of California and a senior scientific adviser to many international enterprises. “While paying attention to academic research, some top professors also hope to apply their achievements at the practical level, which will be of great significance to them.”
When it comes to talent attraction and selection, President Wei emphasizes the attraction of enterprise system and culture to talents. “We have also experienced that large companies use three times the price to steal talents from us.” The competition for talent recruitment is very fierce in China, and President Wei firmly believes in the truth that “gold will shine everywhere”. “An enterprise’s employees are poached by other companies at such a high price, also proves the excellence of talents in this enterprise.” Additionally, it is an irresistible trend that most people are willing to work in large and well-known companies. Regarding this, President Wei said: “Sometimes it’s not necessarily a bad thing for people who are too impetuous to leave the company. Subsequently, President Wei also talked about the talent situation in China and the United States, he said that American technical talents are more willing to stay in small companies. This is because American technicians have a belief that they can change the world. After entering a large company, everyone is like a screw, and maybe they can’t give full play to their own role. Although money, resume and status are important, President Wei still hopes that the domestic AI industry will not embark on the path of vicious talent competition.
4、the Cooperation between Enterprises and Universities will be the Future Trend
Mr. Wei shared the comparison of development of AI industry at home and abroad from the aspects of Technology Application, Capital and Market. From a technical point of view, there are more papers produced in China, but the core technology is still mastered by foreign countries. However, China is developing rapidly in the application field. There are many novel products in both B2B and B2C market. “There is an upside-down phenomenon in China’s AI industry. University research institutions have done too many applications, while enterprises have done too much researches.” This phenomenon is not conducive to the iteration and development of technology, but also leads to the disadvantage of science and technology in China. Although some enterprises are also doing scientific researches, after all, the risk is too high, and it is difficult for enterprises to bear the losses caused by research failure for a long time.
IntelliCloud also attaches great importance to cooperation with colleges and universities. “It mainly falls in the field of scientific research, and there may not be much cooperation in industrial implementation.” Referring to the cooperation with Shanghai International School of Chief Technology Officer of East China Normal University (hereinafter referred to as CTO School), President Wei said he was very optimistic about the concept of CTO School. “Foreign colleges and universities have such courses as CTO and CIO, which are projects in the form of case studies, and their influence is actually limited. The CTO School of East China Normal University focuses on the degree training, which means that it has established a comprehensive education system.” Cross industry comprehensive education doesn’t mean to impetuously and rapidly build talents, in the contrary, it will improve the cultivation of talents and the development of the industry significantly. “With the combination of theory and practice, it will be helpful for the improvement of students’ comprehensive quality.”
From the perspective of capital, many excellent enterprises cannot get enough capital support. It is common for bad money to expel good money. “Many companies that work hard may not get enough support. Instead, some companies that are good at packaging themselves have made huge profits.” From the market point of view, both the government and society have a strong demand for innovation, but it will cause a large waste of resources in the process of investment. This is inevitable, though the regulation ability of domestic market behavior to this phenomenon is still limited and uncertain.
President Wei believes that the joint efforts of schools and enterprises are needed to change this phenomenon in the future. For universities, they need to undertake the important task of leading forward-looking scientific research and cultivating excellent scientific, technological and management talents for society and enterprises. Meanwhile, as for enterprises, President Wei said: I believe the market still expects good products. Certainly, this will put great pressure on small-sized scientific and technological innovation enterprises, while in the face of these difficulties, whether we can devote ourselves to R&D and innovation is the most critical factor to success To some extent, the contribution of technological innovation brought by small enterprises is higher than that of large and well-known ones. It is for this reason that high-quality enterprises will be recognized by the market. As a result, to develop products in a down-to-earth manner and bring substantial progress to China is the important task that should be undertaken and the most basic way of survival for enterprises.
Source | CTO School Think Tank Team
Authors | ZHU Wangning, ZHANG Zhening
Editor | XIA Mei