Big data industry signs big deals at expo

More than 16 billion yuan ($2.43 billion) worth of sales and deals were sealed at the 2017 China International Big Data Expo, organizers said at a news conference on Sunday.

The four-day event closed on May 28 in Guiyang, capital of Southwest China's Guizhou province, after attracting more than 50,000 business and industry leaders and buyers from 20 countries and regions.

IT industry heavyweights, including Jack Ma from Alibaba Group, Ma Huateng from Tencent and Li Yanhong from Baidu Inc, shared their insights on artificial intelligence, the digital economy and intelligent manufacturing.

Big data giants including China's Inspur and US-based Qualcomm displayed their products at the exhibition.

Products displayed included face scanners that can be used to pay bills, lip-reading devices and the 3D short videos on first-aid.

Right up until closing time, children and parents were lining up to go on a virtual reality roller coaster or hunt. Foreign enterprises took up about 45 percent of the 60,000 square meters of exhibition space.

Major domestic and overseas research institutes like IDC and Gartner released data-related reports, including the 2017 Top Ten Black Technologies, Big Data Development Index and Block Chain Technology Blue Paper.

More than 149 million tuned into online broadcasts from the event with page views of the opening ceremony reaching 1.69 billion, organizers said.