Chinese tech companies are starting to take the same path that other western firms have trod in terms of international expansion in a bid to access foreign engineering strategies and talents.
One of the companies that recently joined the trend is Yitu Technology. According to Venture Beat, the artificial intelligence (AI) firm established its first R&D center in Singapore.
It is believed that Yitu's move was made to get in line with other top Chinese tech firms that are also thriving to become international providers. China's largest tech giants have a strategy of building a strong presence in other regions outside of home.
The company said that it aims to "tap into the potential of Singapore and Southeast Asia as key drivers of global growth." Yitu's Singapore R&D center has hired 30 engineers and researchers as a startup but it is expected that the team will expand as demand grows.
China already has a multinational tech company in Huawei, despite setbacks with the U.S. government. The Honor maker has 170 countries that receive its services and products. Just last year, the smartphone giant shipped over 200 million units abroad, beating American iPhone maker Apple in 2018 sales.
With the latest development in Yitu's expansion plans, it was predicted that other Chinese tech providers will follow suit, especially after it was announced that the Singapore center will initially focus on developing AI solutions for smart facilities.
The Straits Times reported that Yitu Technology will work on enhancing speech processing and natural language technologies that commercial customers can make use of. The plan also includes optimization of computer vision methods that can be applied in the medical sector.
Meanwhile, Yitu reached another milestone as part of its efforts in extending its services to the medical sector. The AI giant announced last week that it completed tests for a system that doctors can use for e-records and diagnoses.
According to The Global Times, Yitu Technology said in its report published on Nature Medicine that it was able to use natural language processing (NLP) to come up with highly accurate clinical diagnoses on par with doctors.
The Chinese AI provider's recent progress allowed it to enter CB Insights' list of most promising 100 AI startups along with 4Paradigm, Face++, Momenta, and Sense Time.
Manager of the AI industry research center at CCID Consulting, Zhang Zijun said of the milestone, "It means investors are confident with the technologies developed by Chinese startups, as well as their business strategies and market potential."
