- China’s president announced a new global AI cooperation organization and a series of international initiatives at the opening of WAIC 2026 in Shanghai
- The conference highlights China’s ambition to shape AI infrastructure, governance and monetization as competition moves beyond frontier models
Chinese President Xi Jinping opened the 2026 World Artificial Intelligence Conference (WAIC) and High-Level Meeting on Global AI Governance on Tuesday, marking the first time China’s top leader has attended the event in person since its launch in 2018.
In a keynote speech titled Working Together to Build a Fair and Equitable Global AI Governance System, Xi announced a series of international AI initiatives, including the establishment of the World AI Cooperation Organization in Shanghai as a multilateral platform to coordinate global AI development and help narrow the digital divide.
China will also offer 5,000 AI training opportunities for participants from developing countries over the next five years, establish international AI application cooperation centers across six regional blocs.
These include the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, the Arab League, the African Union, the Community of Latin American and Caribbean States, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and BRICS—and deploy its “Mazu” (妈祖) AI-powered weather early-warning system in 30 countries.
Global AI governance
Among the foreign leaders attending the opening ceremony were Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Manet, Thai Prime Minister Anutin Charnvirakul and U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres.
The announcements came as WAIC reached its largest scale to date, spanning more than 100,000 square meters across four exhibition venues in Shanghai.
More than 1,100 companies are exhibiting over 3,000 products, including more than 300 global debuts, while the conference features over 140 forums and more than 1,400 international guests.
The event also underscored a broader shift in the AI industry. Li Xiaodong (李晓东), director of Tsinghua University’s Internet Governance Research Center, said competition is moving from foundation models to AI infrastructure.
Long-term leadership will depend less on individual models than on data infrastructure, industrial ecosystems and governance frameworks, he argued.
Chinese showcases
That transition is reflected in this year’s exhibits. Huawei publicly showcased its Ascend 950 SuperPoD for the first time, while Eastern Computing (东方算芯) launched what it described as the world’s first software-defined near-memory computing 3D chip.
Robotics companies also took center stage, with Agibot (智元机器人) unveiling its commercial full-size humanoid robot Expedition A3 Ultra, Unitree (宇树科技)displaying a rideable transforming mech, and Ant Group demonstrating multiple pharmacy robots sharing a common AI brain in a simulated retail setting.
Industry executives also highlighted the rapid rise of AI agents.
IDC forecasts the global AI agent market will grow at a compound annual rate of 139% between 2025 and 2030, while IBM and Salesforce estimate more than one billion AI agents will be in operation by the end of 2026.
Why it matters for global readers
For global observers of Chinese technology, especially AI, Xi’s attendance and the launch of a new international AI cooperation body signal China’s intention to play a larger role in shaping global AI governance, alongside continued investment in AI infrastructure and industrial deployment.
The conference also reflects a growing consensus that the next phase of AI competition will be defined not only by model capabilities, but by the ecosystems, computing infrastructure and governance systems that support them.
