ZHAW CAI Industrial AI at the Sino-Swiss Innovation Days 2026 in Hong Kong and Shenzhen
Prof. Dr. Alisa Rupenyan-Vasileva, Rieter Endowed Professor for Industrial AI, participated in the Sino-Swiss Innovation Days 2026 (15–24 April) in Hong Kong and Shenzhen. She delivered a keynote on industrial AI and intelligent automation at the Switzerland–Hong Kong Dialogue on Robotics and Automation Innovation, hosted by the Hong Kong Productivity Council.
From 15 to 24 April 2026, Prof. Dr. Alisa Rupenyan-Vasileva represented the ZHAW Centre for Artificial Intelligence at the inaugural Sino-Swiss Innovation Days, a flagship program organized by Swissnex in China to deepen ecosystem-to-ecosystem dialogue between Switzerland and the Greater Bay Area.
The program brought together Swiss startups, researchers, and industry leaders for a dense week of site visits, panels, and networking across Hong Kong and Shenzhen. The delegation visited HKUST, one of the region's leading research universities, and the Hong Kong Science and Technology Park (HKSTP), the city's largest R&D base and one of Asia's most significant innovation and incubation hubs, housing companies across AI and robotics, biomedical technology, and precision engineering. These visits provided direct insight into how frontier research is translated into industrial application or commercial products, and how Hong Kong's incubation infrastructure connects scientific excellence with commercialization at a very large scale. The visits also created direct opportunities to establish contacts with researchers and startups — both Swiss and Chinese — laying the groundwork for future research and industry collaborations.
On 17 April, Rupenyan-Vasileva gave a keynote titled "Industrial AI in Practice – Advancing Intelligent Automation in the Swiss Innovation Ecosystem" at the Switzerland–Hong Kong Dialogue on Robotics and Automation Innovation, hosted at the Hong Kong Productivity Council (HKPC). The session brought together researchers and industry leaders from both sides to identify concrete collaboration opportunities in robotics and intelligent manufacturing.
The Shenzhen leg of the program included visits to the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology (SIAT), Dobot Robotics, Pudu Robotics, and the Shenzhen InnoX Academy, offering a comprehensive view of China's robotics ecosystem from research and prototyping through to large-scale deployment. A closing panel on Swiss–Greater Bay Area collaboration confirmed strong interest on both sides for structured, long-term exchange in industrial AI and robotics.