The AI industrial park in Qingdao is currently home to more than 200 AI enterprises. [Photo/Jinan Times] 

The artificial intelligence (AI) industrial park in Qingdao, which was put into operation in February last year, is currently home to more than 200 AI enterprises and has nurtured seven nationally-recognized specialized and innovative "little giant" companies.  

Last year, the park achieved an operating income of 17 billion yuan ($2.35 billion), with three billion-yuan-level buildings, contributing greatly to Laoshan district's AI industry revenue of around 28 billion yuan, an increase of about 40 percent year-on-year.

To date, two centers, the Qingdao AI Computing Center and the High-end Intelligent Home Appliance Manufacturing Innovation Center, have been put into operation in the park, while the sub-center industrial park of Donghua Software Co has been completed but is yet to be put into operation. Seven projects with a total investment of about 14.5 billion yuan, including the Inspur Global Research and Development Headquarters, FAW Jiefang (Qingdao) Commercial Vehicle Research Institute, and Qingdao AI Technology Innovation Center are accelerating construction.

According to the plan, the park will focus on three main areas: computing power service support supply, software and hardware integrated innovation source, and industrial intelligent application leadership, relying on the country's only intelligent home appliance national innovation center and the dual-computing power centers of Huawei and Inspur, gradually establishing itself as a center for AI innovation and computing power infrastructure support that empowers Qingdao's industrial development.

The park aims to see its AI industrial output double to more than 60 billion yuan by 2028 and seeks to provide comprehensive support for AI enterprises to rapidly grow and develop.