Microsoft President Brad Smith Visits Microsoft Accelerator Beijing YI Tunnel Demonstrates the Power of China's Innovators
BEIJING, July 28, 2018 (Newswire.com) - Microsoft Accelerator is a program designed to discover and cultivate promising startups around the globe. In the afternoon of July 9, 2018, Microsoft President Brad Smith paid a visit to the Beijing office of Microsoft, focusing on reviewing the innovations of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing’s alumni. He held friendly talks with them during the visit.
Wang Lei, CTO of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing, talked with Brad Smith in detail about the program. He briefed Smith on the general situation of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing over its 6-year history, the program’s future plan, as well as its successful star alumni. Smith expressed his recognition and appreciation for the accomplishments of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing and encouraged the program to create an innovation ecosystem and help startups achieve more.
In the exhibition area for Microsoft Accelerator’s accomplishments, Wang introduced YI Tunnel, an alumnus of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing Cohort 11, to Smith, and also demonstrated how to buy coffee from YI Tunnel’s AI vending machine.
He, first of all, scanned a code to open YI Tunnel’s AI vending machine, and took a bottle of Starbucks Mocha from it according to Smith’s preference. After the door of the vending machine was closed, he immediately received the detailed information about his purchase on his cell phone, including when and where the order was placed, the serial number of the order, as well as the name and price of the item, and the payment process was completely omitted. With a smile of satisfaction and approval, Smith held a lot of expectation for the future of YI Tunnel’s AI solutions.
“YI Tunnel’s AI vending machine is based on a pure-vision technology. It does not need RFID, and you can scan a code to open the door, take an item and go,” Wang said. After watching the demonstration, Smith immediately took a strong interest in the machine and asked about related technical information.
As one of the world’s largest startup accelerator programs, Microsoft Accelerator has been a sacred place for numerous startups. Microsoft Accelerator is also providing support for alumni companies like YI Tunnel in areas such as technology, market, business, and ecosystem partnership, to help accelerate their growth. Smith praised YI Tunnel for its accomplishments both in business and in innovation. This represents the recognition and optimism of the world’s top accelerator program for an innovative Chinese startup. It’s also a bit of encouragement for people at the startup.
YI Tunnel is a renowned AI company in China mainly providing three solutions--the AI vending machine, the unattended store, and the checkout robot. Devoted to using viable, innovative solutions to make retail digital and intelligent, the company digitizes the elements including people (customers), goods (merchandise), and facilities (stores) in offline retail through the computer vision technology centered on the Convolutional Neural Networks, and creates connections among them. This is to empower retailers through the pure-vision tools, so as to lower cost, to increase efficiency, to improve the intelligent management level and user experience, and to drive the shift from traditional retail to a retail model empowered by AI.
Today, YI Tunnel is providing the all-new retail AI solutions for leading Chinese and international retailers and brands such as Country Garden, CSF Market, Yonghui Superstores, Bank of Communications Shanghai, HNA, and Coca-Cola. Meanwhile, YI Tunnel also has a footprint in the overseas retail market of multiple places including Europe, North America, Japan, and the Middle East. Dedicated to the seamless connection between technology and business, YI Tunnel is joining hands with top retailers and brands to accelerate the coming of the AI retail era.
Source: YI Tunnel
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