From humanoids to Huawei: what to watch as Xi attends China’s WAIC amid US AI rivalry

China will use its largest annual artificial intelligence gathering this week to showcase an ambition that extends beyond catching up with the United States in foundation models to building dominance in autonomous agents, scientific research, humanoid robots and consumer devices. The World AI Conference (WAIC) in Shanghai comes amid an intensifying technology rivalry with the US, whose restrictions continue to constrain China’s access to advanced computing chips. Beijing has responded by making.