2026 WIC Wuzhen Summit opens with focus on open-source AI

The 2026 World Internet Conference (WIC) Wuzhen Summit opened Tuesday in Wuzhen, east China's Zhejiang Province, with open-source artificial intelligence (AI) at the center of its agenda.

Under the theme of open source, inclusiveness, joint contribution and shared benefits in building a community with a shared future in cyberspace, the summit brings together government representatives, international organizations, companies and academics from around the world for discussions on innovation, development, security governance, cultural exchanges and international cooperation.

Beyond the opening ceremony, the main forum will host an AI-themed dialogue, bringing together heads of leading sci-tech companies, developers of open-source large models and AI scientists to discuss building a global open-source AI ecosystem.

The summit also features 27 sub-forums covering cyberspace cooperation under the Global Governance Initiative, theory and policy in the digital and intelligent era, robotics and embodied AI.

The WIC Awards for Pioneering Science and Technology were presented Monday, with strong international participation. A total of 20 projects received awards, selected from more than 430 submissions from 43 countries and regions, 18 of them first-time applicants. International submissions rose 21 percent year on year.

The selection of outstanding cases of jointly building a community with a shared future in cyberspace received 360 submissions from 80 countries and regions, including 22 participating for the first time, with 11 cases selected.

The summit was first held in 2014, and the WIC became an international organization headquartered in Beijing in 2022.