Zhejiang University'S "No Man'S Land" Mode Of Government, Industry, University And Research

The innovation and development of regional science and technology and industry is the key to improve the ability of global resource allocation and take the lead in forming a new development pattern in the Yangtze River Delta. Recently, the Ministry of science and technology, the national development and Reform Commission and others jointly issued the "construction plan for the G60 scientific and technological innovation corridor in the Yangtze River Delta", proposing that by 2025, the G60 scientific and technological innovation corridor will be basically built with international influence. According to the "Yangtze River Delta science and technology innovation community construction and development plan" (hereinafter referred to as "the plan") announced by the Ministry of science and technology at the end of 2020, the world's leading science and technology innovation community will be fully built by 2035.

Scientific and technological innovation in the Yangtze River Delta conforms to the national strategy. Previously, the proposal of the CPC Central Committee on formulating the fourteenth five year plan for national economic and social development and the long-term goals for the year 2035 also put forward that "we should adhere to the core position of innovation in the overall situation of China's modernization drive, and take self-reliance in science and technology as the strategic support for national development."

In an interview with the media, Wu Chaohui, academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and President of Zhejiang University, said in an interview that in the construction of a powerful science and technology country with science and technology, universities should not only become an important part of the national strategic scientific and technological strength, but also an important link outside the national strategic scientific and technological power.

As the forefront of scientific and technological innovation, colleges and universities are the main body of scientific and technological innovation and an important force of technological industrialization. They also play the role of personnel training, scientific research and education and promoting social development. Previously, the "Fanxing Science Fund" set up by Zhejiang University in cooperation with various forces supported the construction of "computing +" innovation laboratory, and promoted the cross direction of basic research and frontier exploration in biology, medical, agriculture, food and other fields.

This move will effectively promote the integration of the Yangtze River Delta and achieve the development goal of scientific and technological innovation.

Focus on Yangtze River Delta

Different from the previous basic research, it depends on the input of government funds. The Fanxing science foundation, which is the pioneer of the program, is the product of the cooperation between the government, universities and market forces, and is a more close and high-energy political industry university research innovation consortium. The donor is Fanxing public welfare fund initiated by Huang Zheng, an alumnus of Zhejiang University and founder of pinduoduo.

"From the history of science and technology, every 80 to 100 years, the world's science and technology center will change. Looking at the future of science and technology innovation, apart from Europe and the United States, the Asia Pacific region represented by China will also become an important growth pole. " Wu Chaohui pointed out that Beijing, Tianjin, Hebei, Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta are the three major regions of China's innovation.

According to the global innovation index 2020 released by the world intellectual property organization, China's innovation capacity ranks 14th in the world, which is the same as that in 2019, and is still the only middle-income economy in the top 30. China has 17 science and technology clusters in the world's top 100, ranking second only to the United States.

Taking the Yangtze River Delta as an example, nearly a quarter of China's "double first-class" universities, state key laboratories and national engineering research centers are gathered here, providing a basic platform for the construction of a science and technology innovation community in the Yangtze River Delta. In terms of the linkage of regional innovation resources, the three provinces and one city in the Yangtze River Delta have their own characteristics. For example, Shanghai has outstanding comprehensive advantages, Jiangsu has developed manufacturing industry, Zhejiang has a leading digital economy, and Anhui has active innovation and good ecological resources.

"With the Yangtze River Delta integration development strategy rising to the national strategy, the convergence and connection of innovation resources in three provinces and one city are more frequent, and their energy levels are constantly improving, and they have the ability to participate in international cooperation and competition on behalf of the country." In Wu Chaohui's view, in the construction of the Yangtze River Delta science and technology innovation community, special attention should be paid to the role of basic research and original innovation.

He said that Zhejiang University is promoting the "innovation 2030 plan" in many fields, such as brain science and artificial intelligence, ecological civilization and environmental protection innovation, design and breeding, and strive to produce major original achievements in the basic research of "from 0 to 1" and the key core technology of "neck sticking". In this regard, the first 100 million US dollars donated by the Fanxing Science Foundation will be used for the scientific research projects of "computing + biomedicine", "computing + agricultural food" and "advanced computing".

Innovation mode of Yangtze River Delta

The cooperation between the Fanxing foundation and the Institute of higher research of Zhejiang University is the biggest donation so far. The two sides have jointly established the "Fanxing Science Fund", focusing on the exploration of frontier technology and basic scientific research.

As the first phase of funding, Fanxing public welfare fund will donate US $100 million to the education foundation of Zhejiang University in the next three to five years for the scientific research projects of "computing + biomedical", "computing + agricultural food" and "advanced computing".

From the international point of view, Google, Microsoft, Intel and other technology enterprises are promoting the research work of AI + life science, and exploring and practicing in many cross fields such as biopharmaceuticals and clinical medicine. For the selection of this project, Fanxing Science Foundation said that computer + is a basic scientific research platform. At present, research in basic science fields is closely related to computational power. Many fields, including life science and agriculture, will carry out experimental research with the help of artificial intelligence and high-performance computing methods. Computational power has become an important tool and means of scientific research.

It is not difficult to see that the establishment of Fanxing science fund has changed the previous form of relying on government investment for basic research, and has established a new mode of University led and government industry university research integration.

"Communication, integration and interaction" is the key word in Wu Chaohui's mouth. This awareness is particularly evident in the two cooperative projects between Zhejiang University and Shanghai, the Shanghai Institute of advanced research of Zhejiang University and the Fanxing science foundation.

On the one hand, the participation of market forces not only makes basic research get more sufficient financial support, but also can introduce the concept and means of marketization into the organization and management, operation, demand docking and other aspects of scientific research, so as to improve the research efficiency. Wu Chaohui explained that "in the construction of a powerful country with science and technology, innovative universities should not only become an important part of the national strategic scientific and technological strength, but also become an important link outside the national strategic scientific and technological power."

On the other hand, the development of commerce also depends on the support of science and technology. In the view of Huang Zheng, founder of pinduoduo, business is just a process of gradual progress. "We must do the things in front of us well, then there will be things behind. A lot of underwater things can't be seen by laymen, and it's these things that support pinduoduo to keep going. "

It is worth noting that many entrepreneurs invest in the basic research of cutting-edge science and technology in various forms for the dual demands of corporate social responsibility and long-term sustainable development. Fanxing science foundation, to some extent, is a model innovation in line with international standards.

In this regard, Zhou Ruhong, President of Shanghai Institute of higher research of Zhejiang University and part-time professor of Chemistry Department of Columbia University, believes that the establishment of Fanxing science fund is the practice of Zhejiang University United Fanxing public welfare fund to engage in cutting-edge scientific and technological innovation, as well as a good example of upholding integrity, innovating and exploring the future under the background of integrated development of Yangtze River Delta.

"From the perspective of practice at home and abroad, more and more entrepreneurs are turning their attention to scientific and technological innovation, especially the basic research of" from 0 to 1 ". This trend of the times will accelerate the linkage of scientific and technological innovation, industrial innovation and social innovation, and promote the innovation achievements to better serve the economic and social development. " Wu Chaohui said bluntly.

Four projects

"It is hoped that by promoting the interdisciplinary research of computer +, revolutionary achievements can appear in corresponding fields as soon as possible, and bring qualitative changes to public life." Said the related person of Fanxing fund.

It is worth noting that this year's "fourteenth five year plan" points out that it is necessary to do a good job in tackling key core technologies, aiming at the frontier fields such as artificial intelligence, quantum information, integrated circuits, life health, brain science and so on, and implement a number of forward-looking and strategic national major scientific and technological projects. In this context, the "Fanxing Science Fund" has also formally responded to the strategic policy, and has become a new idea for the government, industry, University and Research Institute to jointly promote high-level scientific and technological innovation.

Specifically, the first projects of Fanxing Science Foundation point to the basic research and frontier exploration in the cross fields of information technology and biology, medical treatment, agriculture, food and so on, and they are all led by international first-class scholars. Among them, "super large scale real-time graph inference engine research" is the first time to carry out fine processing of big data, in order to maximize the value of data. It can be applied to many scenarios, such as how to judge whether credit card is stolen or not in millisecond level in financial risk control, how to make real-time traffic light strategy to ensure smooth roads and so on. The research and application of large-scale dynamic sequence diagram real-time processing technology is also a common key technology based on the development of new generation artificial intelligence.

"Research on basic theory and key technology of next generation brain computer interface" and "design and application of new tumor immune antigen" are based on the field of life science and technology, providing more possibilities for the prevention and treatment of emotional disorders, brain and spinal cord injury diseases, cancer immunotherapy and other major diseases.

Under the premise of environmental protection and sustainable development, the "Research on cell culture of artificial fish" aims to form a bio synthetic fish technology system through interdisciplinary cooperation, integrating synthetic biology, food omics, additive manufacturing and other technologies, so as to produce preliminarily formed cell culture fish surimi, fish meat pieces and other products.

According to the prediction of the food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the global population will reach 9.8 billion in 2050, and the demand for food will increase by 59% ~ 98%, of which the demand for animal derived food will increase by 70%. Animal protein from the sea accounts for about 20% of human needs, and marine food has more than 2000 kinds of active substances with unique structural and physiological characteristics, which is an indispensable food resource for human beings. Through the "Research on cell culture artificial fish meat", we can realize the large-scale production of animal derived protein, and provide more people with safe, healthy and sufficient food sources in the form of artificial meat.

It is worth mentioning that the cast of Fanxing academic committee is participated by top scholars such as academicians of Chinese Academy of engineering and Nobel Prize winners. The chairman of the Council is Wu Chaohui, academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences and President of Zhejiang University. The academic committee is composed of domestic and foreign authoritative experts in relevant fields. The chairman of the first academic committee is Professor Chen Chun, academician of Chinese Academy of engineering. The expert members include Professor Wan Jianmin, Professor Ning Guang, academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Professor Wu Chaohui, academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences Professor Michael Levitt, Nobel Prize winner in chemistry, Professor Raoul BINO, strategic advisor to the board of directors of Wageningen University and Research Center, the Netherlands.

Enterprises promote scientific and technological innovation

In fact, focusing on the future journey of the Starry Sea has become a key word for more and more leaders of top technology enterprises in their career and even in the second half of their life. Over the years, the Melinda Gates Foundation has invested hundreds of millions of scientific research into super dairy cows, artificial meat, circulating water, vaccines and so on. At present, the Gates Foundation has committed $1.75 billion to fight the new epidemic. Musk is also pushing forward its space exploration program through its rocket company, space X.

There is no doubt that the frontier application research and development is still driven by the front-line enterprises. According to the "report on AI index 2019" released by Stanford, MIT, Harvard, openai and other universities and institutions, in 2018, the number of AI papers published by Chinese official research institutions is nearly 300 times more than that of enterprises. But in the United States, the number of papers published by enterprises is more than 50% higher than that published by government agencies. In 2019, the global private sector's investment in AI will reach more than $70 billion, of which $37 billion will be invested in AI start-ups, far more than official investment.

Domestic enterprises pay more and more attention to this. Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei, once mentioned that Huawei's current level is still in the innovation of engineering science such as engineering mathematics and physical algorithm, and has not really entered the basic theoretical research. Major innovation is the survival law of no man's land. Without theoretical breakthrough, technological breakthrough and large amount of technology accumulation, it is impossible to produce explosive innovation.

Huang Zheng also wrote in his resignation letter that in the past few years, pinduoduo's contribution to the agricultural field was mainly in the circulation field. In the future, we should control the cultivation process of agricultural products and research in the field of food science and life science to ensure the rapid and high-quality development of pinduoduo 10 years later.

Ren Zhengfei has seen the pain point of neck sticking from years of communication experience. Huang Zheng has also seen the research problems of life science in the development of pinduoduo. It can be seen that entrepreneurs can better find breakthrough points in scientific and technological innovation from the perspective of business.

Shen NANPENG believes that the starting point of science and commerce is the same, both to solve some problems in the world. The way to success of a truly great enterprise is not only to pursue the maximization of interests, but to solve the pain points of a user around him as the starting point to create more beautiful for users.

Wu Chaohui said that from the practice at home and abroad, more and more entrepreneurs are turning their attention to scientific and technological innovation, especially the basic research of "from 0 to 1". This trend of the times will accelerate the linkage of scientific and technological innovation, industrial innovation and social innovation, and promote the innovation achievements to better serve the economic and social development.

No matter Bezos or Huang Zheng, when the company enters the most stable stage, the impact on the company may be minimized. Just as Ren Zhengfei once said, only major innovation is the survival law of no man's land. Without theoretical breakthrough, technological breakthrough and large amount of technological accumulation, it is impossible to produce explosive innovation.

Perhaps in the near future, the stars will also be able to ride the wind and waves to find their own vast sky.

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