In China, AI is ‘everything, everywhere’. Is there a dark side?

**Albert Wai** (0:02)
This is a podcast by The Straits Times.
Hello, I'm Deputy Foreign Editor, Albert Wai, and welcome to Asian Insider. Today, we are talking about AI and robots in China. As you know, these are important areas for Beijing as it strives to sharpen its technological and competitive edge. Robots or humanoids or whatever these experts try to call them these days, they can do all sorts of marvellous things. They can dance, they can run marathons, and they can play badminton. Of course, they have the occasional hiccups along the way. I also saw a story recently that looked at how AI can analyse what sort of diet you might need using some kind of algorithm about facial recognition, and then the robot will cook for you.
At the same time, they are the AI companions that the Chinese authorities are not entirely comfortable with because of concerns over addiction and other online harms. We will be discussing some of these interesting things. But more importantly, we will also talk about AI governance, impact on jobs, and what it means for China's soft power.
The format of this episode is again a little bit different. Usually, I have Senior China Correspondent Yew Lun Tian with me. And for this episode, we are also involving Daryl Loo, who is another of ST's Senior China Correspondent. And they are both dialing into the studio today. Hello, Lun Tian. Good to see you again.

**Yew Lun Tian** (1:41)
Hi, Albert. Thanks for having me.

**Albert Wai** (1:43)
And hello, Daryl. Would you like to say hi to everyone and tell everyone something interesting about yourself? That's the rule of this podcast.

**Daryl Loo** (1:50)
Sure.
Well, thank you for inviting me to this podcast. And hello to all of our listeners. Just a very brief introduction. I used to be a journalist with the Straits Times many years ago. That was before I moved to China to work for the wires, as well as in tech and for health care companies. Actually one interesting thing that I will say is I myself have been an avid listener of the Asian Insider Podcasts, especially the episodes that feature Albert and Run Tian. You may ask why? Well, I listened to several episodes to prepare for my interview with Albert before I rejoined The Straits Times. Since I'm sitting here, maybe listening to the podcast really helped.

**Albert Wai** (2:36)
Before we go into the heavy stuff, I'm going to call on both of you to share one thing with everyone. Both of you have lived and traveled extensively in China.
Can you start by telling us what is the one most amazing AI or robotic function that you have encountered on the ground, starting with Loon Tian?

**Yew Lun Tian** (2:56)
Oh, okay. I like to go first because I'm very excited. I took a robotaxi ride last week for the first time in my life. I was in a car all alone, no driver. The steering wheel, I could see it turn by itself. It almost looked like a horror movie. It was super cool.

**Albert Wai** (3:14)
And were you at any point concerned about your personal safety, Yew Lun Tian?

**Yew Lun Tian** (3:20)
I checked around. I saw there was this SOS button that I could press. It was very prominently within reach. I also saw this little safety hammer that right by the side of the underneath the window that I can use to open the window in case I'm stuck inside the car. So it was a little bit reassuring, but yeah, otherwise it was just super cool.

**Albert Wai** (3:39)
What about you, Daryl? What is the one coolest thing that you have met?

**Daryl Loo** (3:44)
Just to say that I haven't had a chance to sit in one of those robotaxis that Arun Tian mentioned. So definitely that's the first thing that I'm going to do when I get back to China, hopefully soon. For me personally, what has impressed me about China Robotics in the recent years, it's not so much about the dancing robots or the kung fu fighting marathon running humanoids that a lot of us have read about or seen on TV. As I mentioned, I was in the healthcare industry, so I got many opportunities to visit our factories in Jiangsu, where they were actually making cancer treatments to deliver to global markets.
What I noticed, what really surprised me the first time I visited was that I hardly saw any workers around from formulating the chemicals, to making the pills, and then to packing them into boxes, and actually printing and then pasting the pill boxes with the labels.
All of these were just being done by rows of robots. So the very few workers in some of these factories that I visited, most of them were basically technicians who made sure that these robots were running, the oil was there, and then there were also engineers whose main jobs were to calibrate these machines to ensure that they were optimized constantly. So that was actually when I realized that the whole image that we always have about China as a factory for the world, with all these millions and millions of migrant workers, actually that's very very outdated. Really China factories are being run by robots today. So that has been what is most amazing to me.