The fifth World Artificial Intelligence Conference, which was launched in Shanghai on Thursday and runs through Saturday, will play a bigger role in boosting the nation's innovation progress, said event organizers and participants.

"Shanghai is the center of China's innovative AI development, and the WAIC has become an important platform for promoting AI industrial communications and collaborations," said Jin Zhuanglong, head of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, in a speech via video at the opening ceremony of the conference on Thursday.

In the past four years, the event has attracted more than 2,000 guests and featured over 600 corporate collaborations, while 155 major projects with a combined investment of 110.7 billion yuan ($16 billion) were inked via the platform, said ThePaper.cn, citing the conference organizer.