Chinese artificial intelligence firm SenseTime has started construction of a new supercomputing facility in Shanghai. The company broke ground on the project on Tuesday, and it claims the facility will be a new-generation supercomputing center aimed at enhancing its capabilities and supercomputing powers.
The company chose to build the high-tech center in Shanghai to take advantage of its continued drive to become the global leader in technology innovations. To achieve its goals, Shanghai has rolled out a number of supporting measures to support and attract startups to establishment advanced research and development facilities.
The vice-director of the Shanghai Commission of Economy and Informatization, Zhang Ying, mentioned during the groundbreaking ceremony that the addition of the facility will be an important milestone in Shanghai's continued efforts to bolster AI-based developments. SenseTime currently has supercomputing centers located in Beijing, Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan and Shenzhen.
According to SenseTime, the supercomputing center will be primarily used to support and bolster its current operations, including increasing the efficiency of its proprietary algorithms. The company expects the facility, which is located in Shanghai's Lingang Special Area, to go online by the end of 2021.
SenseTime co-founder and CEO Xu Li mentioned in a statement that the establishment of the facility is part of the company's wider strategy to build a leading artificial intelligence infrastructure that can be used by companies in various industries. Through the use of its advanced AI-based technologies, the company hopes to empower industry leaders to achieve greater growth.
The company's latest facility will be housing a supercomputing platform it built and designed based on its deep-learning framework. Through the platform, SenseTime can design highly customized AI-based solutions for various customers. The platform will be able to support AI-based systems used in industries such as healthcare, transportation, manufacturing, and education.
Some of SenseTime's biggest clients include UnionPay, Huawei Technologies, Xiaomi, Weibo, Suning, and Alibaba Group. Since its establishment in 2014, the company has become one of China's largest and most advanced AI companies. SenseTime also holds the record of being the world's first AI unicorn, with a market valuation of more than $6.75 billion.
Last year, the Chinese company became one of the targets of the US' continued campaign in its trade dispute with China. The US Bureau of Industry and Security added the company to its trade blacklist, along with Huawei, ZTE, and Hikvision, amid the ongoing trade war between China and the US. The agency accused SenseTime of being involved in the oppression of ethnic and religious minorities through the government's use of its facial recognition technology.
