Bulletin No. 2, 2018

Taking CUHK’s Educational Philosophy Northward 17 ‘As many high-tech enterprises such as Tencent, Jingdong (JD) and Huawei have established a presence in Shenzhen, technological research has a very big market here. These enterprises are willing to commission or collaborate with us on special projects. In June 2016, the CUHK (SZ)–Tencent AI Lab Joint Laboratory of Machine Intelligence and CUHK (SZ)–JD Joint AI Laboratory were established with the aim of promoting collaboration between academia and industry.’ Of course, the credit must go to the outstanding team of CUHK (SZ) researchers. ‘After all, it’s one’s research strengths that determine one’s competitiveness in getting grants.’ In order to promote a vibrant research culture on campus and cultivate students’ interest in research and innovation, undergraduates who participate in teachers’ research work or launch their independent research will receive a monthly allowance of RMB 1,000. ‘Some of our undergraduates have even made their way to overseas conferences to present their papers. It’s no mean feat for undergraduates.’ Professor Li said that the research focuses will be on robotics and artificial intelligence, big data, new energy, new materials, bioinformatics, and financial technology. ‘These technologies have been widely applied to our daily lives and are closely related to the progress of society.’ ‘Research at CUHK (SZ) has grown at a rate far beyond my expectation,’ said Prof. Tony Li , Associate Vice- President and director of Research Administration Office. Professor Li admitted that building research capacity is a difficult task. “Research only blossoms in ‘research-rich soil’—the synergy of an outstanding research team, research facilities and funding.” What Professor Li, who is responsible for CUHK (SZ)’s research development, did not expect was that such a newly established institution would receive research funding close to RMB 3 billion in four years. Over 130 research projects have been launched, of which many are supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China, while some are funded by the Shenzhen Municipal Government Basic Research Programme. Professor Li pointed out that sufficient funding and a pool of talented researchers are key to a ‘research-rich soil’. He said, ‘Shenzhen Municipal Government is very supportive of our research. Each Nobel laureate laboratory received RMB 100 million and RMB 50 million from the Shenzhen Municipal Government and the Longgang District Government, respectively. Dedicated Research, Quest for Knowledge