Registration Open | Qiming Venture Partners Entrepreneurship and Investment Forum at 2026 WAIC: The Evolutionary Journey from Computing Power Origins to Application Deployment
Decoding the Paradigm Shift in the LLM Era: How the Industry Can Move Beyond Pure Parameter Chasing Toward Relentless Exploration of Real-World Scenarios, Cost Efficiency, and Closed-Loop Business Models
The 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) will take place in Shanghai from July 17 to 20. After eight consecutive years, WAIC has grown into one of the most influential industry gatherings in global artificial intelligence, serving as a "technology weathervane, application showcase, industry accelerator, and governance forum."
On the afternoon of July 19, 2026, Qiming Venture Partners will host the "Qiming Venture Partners · Entrepreneurship and Investment Forum — The Evolutionary Journey from Computing Power Origins to Application Deployment" at the Shanghai World Expo Center, the main venue of WAIC. This marks Qiming Venture Partners' fourth consecutive appearance at WAIC. Aligned with WAIC's theme of "Intelligent Partners, Co-creating the Future," this forum focuses on the cutting-edge dynamics of AI in entrepreneurship and investment. It will bring together top scientists, innovation leaders, and seasoned investors, featuring three keynote speeches, one in-depth dialogue, one roundtable discussion, and the重磅 release of three core outputs — collectively decoding the paradigm shift of the large model era: exploring how the industry can move beyond pure parameter chasing toward extreme exploration of real-world scenarios, cost reduction and efficiency gains, and closed-loop business models.
In 2026, artificial intelligence has moved beyond mere parameter competition and concept hype, officially entering a critical cycle of deep evolution from "technological ideal" to "industrial reality." From generational shifts in computing infrastructure to the comprehensive awakening of intelligence in the physical world, AI is penetrating every micro-node of manufacturing, healthcare, and business decision-making. This is not merely a technological evolution, but a journey of transformation in productivity and business logic.
As one of the most forward-looking and influential venture capital institutions in the AI space, Qiming Venture Partners has long been deeply rooted in technology and serves as an early discoverer and deep builder of China's AI industrial ecosystem. To date, Qiming Venture Partners has invested in over 100 AI projects with a total investment of 12 billion RMB. Through comprehensive industrial chain coverage spanning underlying computing power, foundation models, multimodal technology, Embodied Artificial Intelligence, and vertical applications, Qiming Venture Partners has successfully identified and helped grow multiple innovation benchmark companies, witnessing AI's entry into an era of intelligent explosion.
This year's "Qiming Venture Partners · Entrepreneurship and Investment Forum — The Evolutionary Journey from Computing Power Origins to Application Deployment" will cover topics including general world models, AI infrastructure construction, brain-computer interaction, and the global robotics ecosystem. It will deeply showcase the latest breakthroughs in Embodied Artificial Intelligence, edge computing, multimodal perception, and brain-computer interfaces, exploring how AI evolves from "technological ideal" to "industrial engine" and its systematic value creation in real-world scenarios, operational efficiency, and commercial closed loops.
At this conference, Qiming Venture Partners will also重磅 release three core outputs, comprehensively sharing its deep industry insights and落地 achievements.
Qiming Venture Partners has released "Top Ten AI Outlooks" for three consecutive years (2023–2025) at WAIC, providing sustained observation and judgment on AI's development direction around technology evolution, industrial trends, and commercialization pathways. It successfully anticipated the development of key trends including large models, multimodal models, Agent, Embodied Artificial Intelligence, and AI applications. As AI enters a new development stage, technological breakthroughs, product innovation, and commercialization are now mutually reinforcing. Looking ahead, what directions will AI continue to develop along? Which trends merit long-term attention? The 2026 Qiming Venture Partners AI Top Ten Outlooks will continue to combine the latest global AI industry developments, sharing latest thinking on the next round of technology evolution and industrial opportunities from AI models and AI infrastructure to AI application innovation.
Qiming Venture Partners will also jointly debut the latest global progress of RoboChallenge, including the latest results of the Embodied Foundation Model Leaderboard, real-robot challenge results from top international academic conferences such as CVPR and ICRA, and the latest progress on EAI Bench officially launched at the AI for Good Global Summit in Geneva. At the same time, it will announce the new batch of RoboChallenge international organizing committee members and ecosystem partners. Relying on an open, shared real-robot evaluation platform, it connects models, hardware platforms, developers, and industrial partners to jointly build a global open ecosystem for Embodied Artificial Intelligence, promoting China's Embodied Artificial Intelligence technology, standards, and ecosystem onto the international stage.
Additionally, Qiming Venture Partners will jointly debut with Peking University the authoritative report The International Landscape of AI Governance, mapping out AI governance approaches in China, the United States, the European Union, and major international organizations, analyzing existing AI governance pathways, and providing reference for promoting more open, inclusive, secure, and sustainable international AI governance.
Registration details are as follows
Past Highlights
Qiming Weekly | Top 10 News from Qiming Venture Partners Portfolio Companies Vol.22, 2026.6.30
Qiming Honors | 5 Qiming Venture Partners Investors Named to 2025 Forbes China Midas List
Qiming Venture Partners was founded in 2006. Currently, Qiming Venture Partners manages 11 USD funds and 7 RMB funds, with total assets under management reaching $9.5 billion. Since its inception, it has focused on investing in outstanding early- and growth-stage companies in Technology and Healthcare innovation.
To date, Qiming Venture Partners has invested in over 580 high-growth innovative companies, of which more than 210 have gone public on the New York Stock Exchange, NASDAQ, Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited, Shanghai Stock Exchange, and Shenzhen Stock Exchange, or exited through mergers and acquisitions. Over 80 companies have become recognized unicorns or super-unicorns.
Many of Qiming Venture Partners' portfolio companies have grown into the most influential companies in their respective fields, including Xiaomi (01810.HK), Meituan (03690.HK), Bilibili (NASDAQ:BILI, 09626.HK), Zhihu (NYSE:ZH, 02390.HK), Roborock (688169.SH), Hesai Technology (NASDAQ:HSAI, 02525.HK), UBTECH (09880.HK), WeRide (NASDAQ:WRD, 0800.HK), HyperStrong (688411.SH), Insta360 (688775.SH), Unisound (09678.HK), Biren Technology (06082.HK), Zhipu AI (02513.HK), Gan & Lee Pharmaceuticals (603087.SH), Tigermed (300347.SZ, 03347.HK), Zai Lab (NASDAQ:ZLAB, 09688.HK), CanSino Biologics (688185.SH, 06185.HK), Schrödinger (NASDAQ:SDGR), MicroPort EP MedTech (688617.SH), Sanyou Medical (688085.SH), Amoy Diagnostics (300685.SZ), SinoCellTech (688520.SH), Insilico Medicine (03696.HK), Hope Medicine, Yuanxin Technology, MediLink Therapeutics, LaNova Medicines, StepFun, and others.