Create the "Most Beautiful Window" for Innovation and Entrepreneurship! The Global Finals of the 2021 International Maker Competition Kicks off in Suzhou

Today (July 8th), the global finals of the 2021 "Win in Suzhou, Create and Win the Future" International Maker Competition kicked off in Suzhou. After rounds of public preliminary selection, domestic sub-competitions, and expert re-evaluation, 14 outstanding contestants stood out and came to the scene to engage in a "peak duel" on the stage in Suzhou. Airui Company provided Chinese-English simultaneous interpretation and equipment rental services for this series of competitions.

The "Win in Suzhou, Create and Win the Future" International Maker Competition was founded in 2011. It is a global high-level talent innovation and entrepreneurship competition brand carefully built by Suzhou. The competition interacts with the Suzhou International Elite Entrepreneurship Week, aiming to continuously explore outstanding talents (teams) and projects in leading industries and frontier scientific and technological fields, promote the precise docking of talents, projects, industries, and capital, and build a green channel for innovation and entrepreneurship leading to Suzhou. Up to now, the competition has held more than 70 events, covering more than 40 countries and regions around the world, attracting 7,900 projects to participate, with a cumulative of more than 29,000 people observing and participating in on-site activities. Already 124 projects have chosen to settle in Suzhou through the competition, helping a large number of talents take root in Suzhou and bravely start their great undertakings, forming an international competition brand that covers the world, focuses on industries, has distinct characteristics, and combines advantages.

In March this year, the global preliminary selection of projects for the International Maker Competition was launched. Currently, the competition has held 5 domestic competitions in cities such as Wuhan, Beijing, Chengdu, Shenzhen, and Shanghai, and 8 overseas competitions in places such as Australia, Sweden, Japan, the United States, the Netherlands, Finland, Singapore, and France. A total of 1,157 projects were solicited in the 13 sub-competition finals, including 560 domestic projects and 597 overseas projects. In the second half of the year, the competition will also hold 2 overseas competitions in the United Kingdom and Germany.

This year's competition actively adapts to the new era and new situation, more prominently highlighting the orientation of "focusing, being practical, being open, and being innovative", expanding the scale of the competition, optimizing the competition organization mode, increasing policy incentives, and strengthening settlement services, accelerating the gathering of high-level talents and teams at home and abroad, helping Suzhou build a "paradise for entrepreneurs and innovators", and creating the "most beautiful window" for Suzhou's innovation and entrepreneurship facing the world.

Compared with previous years, the 2021 "Win in Suzhou, Create and Win the Future" International Maker Competition has set up 5 domestic sub-competition areas including Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei, Greater Bay Area, Yangtze River Delta, Central China Region, and Southwest China, 10 overseas sub-competition areas including Oceania, Sweden, Japan, North America, Europe, Finland, Singapore, France, United Kingdom, and Germany, as well as the global finals. The scale of the competition reaches a historical high. The domestic sub-competition areas hold on-site competitions offline, while the overseas sub-competition areas adopt the "dual-venue" model of overseas and Suzhou. Through cross-border "screen-to-screen" online roadshows, a "cloud arena" is built, with flexible and diversified docking methods.

The competition also presents many highlights. Focusing on building the "Suzhou Manufacturing" brand and accelerating the construction of a modern industrial system, the competition increases the invitation to participate in projects in key emerging industries, leading industries, "bottleneck" technologies, and digital economy fields in Suzhou. The sub-competition areas newly organize vertical industrial professional competitions, with a total of 9 major industrial tracks. Each competition area combines the advantageous industries of the host city, each focusing on 1-3 industrial groups for competition, forming an innovative cooperation mechanism across regions and industries. For the first time, the overseas sub-competition areas adopt the "dual-selection model" of ten county-level cities and districts in Suzhou and overseas hosting institutions to organize competitions, closely following the industrial layout and recruitment needs of various places in Suzhou, and constructing a project solicitation and competition system with different focuses, distinct characteristics, and synchronous resonance.

Policy support is further "intensified". There are a total of 104 award-winning places in the competition. Based on the generous bonus, the "through train" system of the municipal leading talent policy is upgraded, and the "green channel" for docking the participating projects with talent policies and talent services is established and improved to provide all-round support for the award-winning projects to settle in Suzhou. Among them, the settlement projects of the first prize in the finals and the second and third prizes that have received investment of more than 10 million yuan from market-oriented funds can directly be included in the Gusu Leading Talent Plan, and after the project is landed in Suzhou, relevant support policies will be enjoyed according to regulations. The excellent projects of the competition can also obtain the "through card" for participating in the Suzhou International Elite Entrepreneurship Week, enabling zero-distance docking with the high-quality and abundant innovation and entrepreneurship resources in Suzhou.

This year's competition has attracted more than a hundred first-line venture capitalists to join, inviting top venture capitalists and heads of leading enterprises to serve as judges and mentors, providing full-course entrepreneurship coaching and capacity acceleration for participating projects, promoting the high-level circulation of technology, capital, and industry, allowing more scientific and technological innovation achievements to move from the "laboratory" to the "market", from the "bookshelf" to the "shelf". Focusing on the "first bucket of gold" for entrepreneurship, the competition relies on state-owned mother funds such as the Suzhou Angel Mother Fund and the Gusu Talent Fund, guiding sub-funds to invest in high-quality projects of the competition; focusing on the "first station" for entrepreneurship, optimizing the "Yun Chuang Hui" online project docking management platform, fully importing the competition projects, promoting nearly 200 carrier parks in the city to carry out regular online docking, and providing preferential treatment in terms of rent, financial support, and information service for the projects to land in Suzhou, striving to construct a full-chain entrepreneurship support ecological system.

At the finals site, awards were also presented to the winners of the merit awards and the "Popularity King" contestants, and plaques were awarded to the outstanding member units of the Create and Win the Future Venture Capital Alliance. It is reported that the contestants who won the top three places in the finals will be announced at the opening ceremony of the 2021 (13th) Suzhou International Elite Entrepreneurship Week and the 2nd Suzhou Scientists Day on July 10th.

◀️：Airui Global Translation Provided Simultaneous Interpretation Services for the "Addressing Climate Change and Carbon Emission Reduction" Academic Seminar

▶️：China Beverages Launched the "Mizone Green Action for College Students"