A robot welcomes guests to the World Artificial Intelligence Conference in Shanghai on Sept 17, 2018. [Photo/IC]

The 2020 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) is scheduled to take place from July 9 to 11, according to the Shanghai government's news briefing on June 22. It was also confirmed that, in light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the event will be hosted online.

As a platform for AI exchanges and cooperation, the annual conference hosted by the Shanghai government gathers the most influential AI scientists and entrepreneurs to discuss the development of the AI industry, and is part of the city's efforts to increase its role as an international hub for AI innovation.

This year, the three-day conference will feature a series of online events including one opening ceremony, two plenary sessions, a number of forums, a large-scale AI exhibition, project releases and interactive activities.

The organizing committee has invited over 500 luminaries from the AI field around the world, including Turing Award recipients, Nobel laureates, industry leaders and representatives of international organizations.

Last year, the high-profile dialogue between Jack Ma and Elon Musk at the conference attracted much attention and this year, more top scientists and business leaders such as Manuel Blum, winner of the 1995 Turing Award and Robin Li, founder of Baidu, have confirmed their attendance.

They will deliver speeches and share views on hot topics such as the future trends of AI technologies, various AI application scenarios and how AI empowers social and economic development.

Frontier AI issues relating to machine learning, brain-inspired intelligence and automatic unmanned systems will also be discussed at the forums.

The conference will have its main studio in Shanghai, and other studios in the United States, Germany, France and Singapore, each launching live streams.

The online exhibition will display the latest AI applications in the areas of medical care, finance, industries, urban management, education and transportation and provide visitors with immersive experiences via 5G, VR and AR technologies.

Around 150 enterprises are expected to participate in the exhibition. In addition to leading enterprises in the AI industry that were participants in last year's exhibition, such as Microsoft, Amazon, Alibaba, Tencent, Huawei and iFlytek, enterprises that have been deepening the application of AI technology such as AstraZeneca, Qualcomm, JD Cloud, and Bank of China are also on the list of exhibitors.

A number of new products, technologies, and innovation and entrepreneurship projects will make their debut during the conference and an online meeting room has been set up to help connect investors with developers.

Last year's conference witnessed signing ceremonies for 33 major AI projects, and some of the projects have been put into operation in Shanghai, according to Zhang Ying, deputy director of the city's commission of economy and information technology.