Photo/Shetuwang

July 5 (NBD) -- Candidates for college entrance examination Wednesday finished college applications, and data collected shows that AI-related majors have become the most sought-after among students. 

According to a list issued by the Ministry of Education, 35 universities and colleges including Tsinghua University and Peking University have received approval to set up the four-year undergraduate AI-related majors amid the country's drive to build a strong AI talent pool.

"The popularity of AI-related majors this year is due to the surging demand," Shi Yuanchun, director of Intelligent Human Computer Interaction Research Center under Tsinghua University, said to news outlet 21st Century Business Herald. 

National Business Daily noted that the talent demand in the field of AI saw an 8-fold increase in the past three years, according to the Global AI Talent Report by LinkedIn in early 2019. 

Globally, China is hiring the most AI jobs overall with over 10,000 vacancies last year, according to the 2018 AI Index annual report by Stanford University. In the third quarter of 2018, the ratio of AI job vacancies to job hunters was 1.25, which means 125 positions scrambled for 100 job seekers. 

"The versatile feature enables AI to be a transformative business force, and diverse talents are in strong demand, including those proficient in deep learning, algorithms, AI vision and language as well as development of system, software and hardware," remarked Zhang Chunjuan, executive director of human resources at AI startup SenseTime. 

Currently, China's internet giants including Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent as well as startups are hiring AI talents with fat pay. 

A fresh postgraduate with Shanghai Jiao Tong University said that postgraduates majoring in AI algorithms, voice interaction and vision were offered annual pay of 400,000-500,000 yuan (58,227-72,783 U.S. dollars) and doctoral students 600,000-800,000 yuan.

Statistics shows that China's AI market totaled 1.76 billion U.S. dollars in 2018, and the figure is predicted to hit 11.9 billion U.S. dollars by 2023. It is projected that China will become the world's major AI innovation center by 2030.

Email: lansuying@nbd.com.cn