For the past four years, RISE has brought speakers from the biggest international companies, together with some of the world’s most exciting startups, to Hong Kong. And this year, more than 15,000 attendees registered to hear from 316 speakers, including Microsoft president Brad Smith, Didi Chuxing co-founder Bob Zhang, Grab co-founder Tan Hooi Ling, and Amazon CTO Werner Vogels, amongst others.
RISE is produced by the team behind Web Summit, Europe’s largest tech conference. Paddy Cosgrave, CEO and co-founder of Web Summit said of this years’ event: “We have a 40% increase in the number of startups at RISE this year. This is a testament to how the region truly has arrived on the global tech scene. Our exclusive poll of global investors bears this out. Two thirds agree that China will become the world power in tech within five years.”
CEOs and founders of tech start-ups, together with people from across the global technology industry, as well as related industries, discussed trends driving innovation and progress in major industries.
Talk headings included titles such as: The New Era of Influencers; Hollywood’s Initiative to Keep Online Searching Safe; Where is the Next Unicorn Coming From and Meet the Virtual Human – New Opportunities for Chinese Robots, just to mention a few.
From office cooks to film stars, we look at some of the most talked about personalities at this year’s event.
SEARCHING STARRING JOHN CHO
Searching is a film that sees John Cho as a Bay Area executive who must trace his missing-presumed-kidnapped daughter’s digital footprints before she disappears forever.
It highlights our reliance on a digital world, and the dangers of our online trail. Cho and Google executive-turned-film director, Aneesh Chaganty describe the film “as a “conventional thriller told in an unconventional way.”
After a successful debut at the Sundance Film Festival, “Searching” was picked up by Sony Pictures. The film team hosted an exclusive press conference at RISE – fitting given the nature of the tense, hyper-modern thriller for today’s digital age and the ethical issues surrounding technology and social media.
In partnership with TechCrunch at RISE, the film team announced a competitive hackathon to actively seek (Google) Chrome Extensions that can help parents and children be more mindful of their digital lives.
For John Cho, “[The film] has made me think more about [my own kids] and social media accounts. Furthermore, the sounds of a computer booting up have an emotional connotation for me that I wasn’t even aware of. That’s part of the excitement of the film, aside from the story, it’s just opening up a new vocabulary of storytelling. The pause in the cursor carries a weight that I wasn’t aware of.”
MS. YEAH
Ms. Yeah is not your typical chef, but her distinct genre of vlogging herself using office equipment to make edible dishes have gone viral, and made her one of the most famous Internet celebrities in the world, with more than 40 million followers and more than 7 billion views. The videos are characterized by lack of narration, voice-over or conversation; posing almost no language barrier, something which has helped popularize the channel around the world.
Growing up, Ms. Yeah – real name Zhou Xiaohui – learned cooking from her father, who managed a hotel. Among her creations, she has grilled beef with an iron, popped popcorn in a soda can, and made a DIY oven with a desk drawer and a light bulb.
“There is no language in my videos and no barrier, food itself is a language and everybody loves food.”
SEAN RAD – FOUNDER OF TINDER
In 2012, Sean Rad founded Tinder, the app making love happen for people all over the world with the swipe of a finger and becoming one of the most defining characteristics of human interactions in the digital era. Rad was the company’s CEO and Chairman until late 2016.
During his first visit to Asia, the Californian entrepreneur and investor shared his predictions on the future of dating apps, new technology and the startup industry, as well as what he believes made Tinder the success it is – namely removing the element of rejection.
“We came up with this idea: if I like somebody I can swipe right and like, but they won’t know that until they also like me back and it removes the element of rejection. That was what really revolutionised not just the online dating space, but revolutionised dating, period. The “swipe,” is such a cool thing to remember and talk about, transforming a very simple
METTA WORLD PEACE FOUNDER – GRADELO.COM
Metta World Peace, formerly known as Ron Artest, is a former NBA champ, most recently with the L.A. Lakers. Metta founded the app Gradelo, which provides a social networking platform built around sports and athletes, connecting athletes with peers, fans, businesses and different kinds of services ranging from education and mental health help, to coaching gigs.
The basketball-star-turned-tech-entrepreneur isworking on launching a Chinese-language service of Gradelo, and while there’s no timetable for the China launch, Gradelo has already registered the Gradelo.cn domain.
“Basketball is a short life. You still have a lot of life to live [after retirement],” Metta World Peace said.
