(Front row, from left) Mr Zhou Bo, Chairman of the Board, Cloudbae Company, and Mr Eddie Lee, Overseas Marketing Director, Cloudbae Company, with representatives from the Nanning Association for Science and Technology, Nanning Municipal Science and Technology Bureau, China (Guangxi) Pilot Free Trade Zone Nanning Area Administrative Committee, Nanning Municipal Development and Reform Commission, Nanning Foreign Affairs Office, and Liangqing District Science and Technology Bureau.
SUSS and Cloudbae – a subsidiary of Alibaba Group, and a smart city operator in Nanning working on the integration of commercial, government and industrial networks – have partnered to enhance international collaboration in education and entrepreneurship.
The virtual signing ceremony of the Memorandum of Understanding was held on 5 March 2021 with Cloudbae Company’s Chairman of the Board Mr Zhou Bo and Overseas Marketing Director Mr Eddie Lee, and Professor Tsui Kai Chong, Provost of SUSS, sealing the partnership. The ceremony was witnessed by representatives from Nanning municipal organisations and SUSS.
Since then, Cloudbae and SUSS have worked closely together on several initiatives. Seventeen students from Nanning took part in the ASEAN-China Impact Start-up Challenge organised by SUSS, where they ideated and validated their solutions together with teammates from Singapore and other ASEAN countries. These ideas ranged from e-waste recycling to a community recruitment platform for the creative industry.
Ten students from Nanning also participated in the recently concluded Gig Academy for SUSS students, where they learnt about freelancing, e-commerce, micro-influencing, digital marketing and sales techniques from industry experts.
One of the key programmes that SUSS and Cloudbae have collaborated on is the China-ASEAN New Smart City Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition. Into its fourth year now, the competition has drawn start-up ideas from China and ASEAN participants, and given them the opportunity and resources to enter the Chinese market.
At the China-ASEAN Smart City Innovation Centre in Nanning, start-ups recommended by SUSS can also access free co-working facilities at the incubation space, which allows them to tap on the resources and networks to launch their start-ups in China.
Mr Lee said: “2021 is the 30th anniversary of the establishment of dialogue between China and ASEAN. Boosting people-to-people exchange and innovation will continue to deepen the cooperation between nations. Cloudbae will continually work with SUSS and ASEAN partners to support youth start-up and entrepreneurs, obtaining great potential for reciprocal cooperation between China and ASEAN, with the digital economy development and the signing of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership.”