Shaping a smart world

Li Yanhong calls on people to embrace the AI era.[Photo by Deng Gang/China Daily]

Tech executives release new books in China on the future of artificial intelligence. Xing Yi reports.

The next decade will belong to artificial intelligence. This is what Kai-fu Lee, a former executive with tech companies such as Google Inc and Microsoft Corp, said at his commencement speech to students at Columbia University on May 15.

Lee makes his point clearer in a new book, Artificial Intelligence, which he co-authored with Wang Yonggang, a former software engineer at Google.

The book was published in Chinese in May.

After getting his PhD in computer science from Carnegie Mellon University in the 1980s, Lee devoted three decades in AI research.

"In the next 10 years, all financial companies will be turned upside down, with AI replacing traders, bankers, accountants ..." Lee said during his speech, joking that he would fire his private banker because his investment algorithm has proved to be more efficient than human bankers.