Tencent AI Lab and Nature Research Forge Strategic Alliance to Advance Interdisciplinary 'AI + Healthcare' Innovation

VCBeat has learned that on March 15, at the “Second Academic Forum of Tencent AI Lab,” Tencent AI Lab officially entered into a strategic partnership with Nature Research, part of Springer Nature, a leading international academic and educational publishing group. The two parties will jointly promote interdisciplinary research in the field of “AI + Healthcare” and foster the integration of industry, academia, and research in artificial intelligence (AI).

Both parties will focus on addressing practical pain points in the healthcare sector, exploring ways to integrate global scientific research resources through various initiatives such as academic grants and industry-academia-research exchanges. This collaboration aims to support interdisciplinary cooperation between the medical industry and artificial intelligence research, thereby accelerating the development and commercialization of more “AI + Healthcare” products.。

The two parties will also jointly host the Nature Conference in Shenzhen next year. This marks the first time that Nature Research has partnered with a technology enterprise to launch an international academic conference on artificial intelligence, aiming to foster exchange and interaction between the Chinese and global scientific research communities and industry, and to promote the translation and implementation of academic achievements in this field.

At the signing ceremony, Yao Xing, Vice President of Tencent and Head of Tencent AI Lab, stated that Tencent AI Lab has been actively promoting the creation of an industry-academia-research ecosystem in collaboration with various sectors. The AI Lab and Nature Research share common goals in advancing artificial intelligence, particularly in addressing major human challenges such as those in healthcare. By joining forces, the two parties will further accelerate the realization of the vision to “Make AI Everywhere,” aiming to achieve breakthroughs in livelihood areas of significant public benefit, including healthcare.

Yao Xing, Vice President of Tencent and Head of AI Lab

Dean Sanderson, Managing Director of Nature Research, stated, “Our group is driven by the mission to ‘advance discovery,’ and we recognize that research findings can generate significant positive social and economic impact when widely adopted beyond the scientific community. Therefore, we have been committed to bringing together individuals from all sectors worldwide, including scientists, through platforms such as Nature conferences, to join us in advancing this mission. We are delighted to establish a strategic partnership with Tencent AI Lab to foster interaction and collaboration among researchers across countries and with industry, thereby promoting research and applications in the field of artificial intelligence globally for the benefit of society.”

Dean Sanderson, Managing Director of Nature Research

“AI + Healthcare” is a prominent and tangible application scenario for artificial intelligence, and it will also be one of the key areas of collaboration between the two parties. In 2017, Tencent launched its first “AI + Healthcare” product, “Tencent Miying,” which can screen an endoscopic examination in less than 4 seconds, achieving a detection rate of up to 90% for early-stage esophageal cancer. Currently, the product has expanded from its initial focus on early screening for esophageal cancer to include screening for multiple conditions such as pulmonary nodules, diabetes, and fundus lesions, and has been deployed in more than 100 Grade A tertiary hospitals across various provinces and cities in China.

On November 15, 2017, the Ministry of Science and Technology convened a launch meeting for the Development Plan for New-Generation Artificial Intelligence and major science and technology projects, announcing the first batch of national open innovation platforms for new-generation artificial intelligence. The National New-Generation Artificial Intelligence Open Innovation Platform for Medical Imaging was established leveraging Tencent’s technological capabilities, making “Tencent Miying” a national benchmark for “AI + Healthcare.”

Springer Nature’s publishing strengths span the natural sciences, engineering, medicine, and other fields. In the field of artificial intelligence (AI), Nature Research has published many groundbreaking research advances in AI in its flagship journal, Nature, and launched a new subsidiary journal focused on artificial intelligence, Nature Machine Intelligence, in 2019. Springer, part of the group, has published thousands of books and journal articles on AI and robotics, including the popular award-winning book Springer Handbook of Robotics. In addition, in the medical field, Nature Research’s leading comprehensive academic journals publish many breakthrough research results in the medical field every year.

At the forum, Tencent also announced the imminent establishment of its robotics laboratory, “Robotics X.” Robotics X and the AI Lab will serve as the two foundational pillars of Tencent’s AI industry, further exploring the connection between the virtual and physical worlds.

“The 2nd Tencent AI Lab Academic Forum” focused on cross-disciplinary research and applications in four major fields: healthcare, gaming, multimedia content, and human-computer interaction. Twenty top artificial intelligence experts from around the world, including Tomaso Poggio, Professor of Artificial Intelligence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, attended the forum to discuss and exchange insights on cutting-edge achievements.

Nature Research offers a suite of high-quality products and services dedicated to the research community, spanning the life sciences, physical sciences, chemistry, and applied sciences, including journals, databases, and researcher services.

Nature, founded in 1869, is the world’s leading weekly scientific journal. In addition, Nature Research publishes a portfolio of subscription journals bearing the “Nature” title, the prominent multidisciplinary open-access journal Nature Communications, other open-access journals including Scientific Reports, and Nature Partner Journals published in collaboration with research institutions and societies. Together, these journals publish some of the most important scientific discoveries in the world.

In terms of online dissemination, more than 9 million unique visitors access Nature Research content via nature.com each month, including *Nature* news and commentary, as well as the renowned researcher recruitment platform, Naturejobs. Nature Research also provides a range of services for researchers, such as online and in-person training, professional language polishing, and editing services. For more information, please visit nature.com. Nature Research is a member of the Springer Nature group.

Tencent AI Lab was established in 2016, focusing on fundamental research and application exploration in artificial intelligence. It continuously enhances AI's capabilities in decision-making, understanding, and creation, while providing AI technical support for Tencent's various product businesses.

The vision of the AI Lab is to build comprehensive AI capabilities, “Make AI Everywhere.”

The fundamental research areas of focus for the AI Lab include computer vision, speech recognition, natural language processing, and machine learning. In alignment with Tencent’s business operations, it has identified four application directions: gaming, content, social networking, and tool-platform AI.

Its products have already been deployed in over a hundred applications, including WeChat, QQ, and TianTian KuaiBao. The laboratory currently employs more than 50 AI scientists from world-renowned institutions (90% of whom hold PhDs) and over 200 experienced AI application engineers, striving to achieve “academic influence and industrial output.”

Source: Tencent Technology