TIME100 AI 2026 · Thinkers
Zhou Bowen
Director and Chief Scientist, Shanghai AI Laboratory
After 15 years at IBM, he now directs the Shanghai AI Lab and chairs a Chinese standards group shaping how frontier AI risks are measured.
- Born
- 1976, Fengcheng, Jiangxi
- Now
- Director and Chief Scientist, Shanghai AI Laboratory
- Studied
- University of Colorado Boulder, Chinese Academy of Sciences, University of Science and Technology of China
Interesting facts
- Before AI
Spent 14 years at IBM Research in New York, rising to chief scientist of the IBM Watson Group.
web.ee.tsinghua.edu.cn - Detour
Left IBM to run cloud and AI at Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com, then founded a startup and became a Tsinghua professor.
web.ee.tsinghua.edu.cn - Numbers
Says less than 1% of the world's computing power goes to AI safety, with 99% used for model training.
baike.baidu.com - First
In 2026 he became chair of a new working group in China's TC260 standards body on how to measure frontier AI risks.
time.com - In their words
Compares advanced AI to a cute tiger cub that may devour humans once it is grown.
news.sciencenet.cn
Career
- Shanghai AI LaboratoryDirector and Chief Scientist2024 to now
- Tsinghua UniversityChair Professor, Department of Electronic Engineering2022 to now
- Frontis.aiFounder2021 to now
- JD.comSVP; President of JD Cloud & AI, JD Cloud & AI2017–2021
- IBMChief Scientist, IBM Watson Group; Director of AI Foundations, IBM Research2003–2017
Education
- PhD, Electrical and computer engineering, University of Colorado Boulder, 2003
- MS, Chinese Academy of Sciences
- BEng, Electrical and information engineering, University of Science and Technology of China
