An agreement to establish an institute for research into the core technology of interdisciplinary information was signed by the Xi’an High-tech Industrial Development Zone, Shaanxi province and Tsinghua University on Aug 26.

Yang Renhua, director of the zone’s administrative committee, said the newly-launched institute will be built in the zone’s new software town and is intended to be a highland for the integration of industry, education and research in the field of artificial intelligence in China and the world.

The project will be undertaken by Yao Qizhi, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and President of the Institute for Interdisciplinary Information Science, Tsinghua University.

Nearly 30 professors from the institute will also participate in preparations.

According to Yang, the project will include a Center for Financial Technology and Regulatory Science and Technology, a Center for Frontier Architecture and Intelligent Chips, and a Center for Urban Brain Research.

The project will help build Xi'an into a hard science and technology capital and will bring profound changes to China and the world, Yang added.

Wang Yongkang, Party secretary of the Xi’an municipal committee, said the newly-launched institute is the latest cooperation between the zone and the university and is another major project in the development of Xi'an’s artificial intelligence industry.

Tsinghua’s institute for Interdisciplinary Information Science led by Yao opened on Dec 30, 2010. It promotes interdisciplinary research and has established a cryptographic foundation based on computational complexity theory.

On May 28 this year, China's key AI enterprise IFLYTEK CO., LTD also settled its projects of launching a national first-class AI innovation center and a Silk Road research headquarters in the Xi'an High-tech Zone.

With the arrival of projects led by major innovative participants in interdisciplinary information science the zone’s AI ecological chain will undergo rapid development.