Sailing with Digital Intelligence – From a History of 150 Years to the Future

On December 28th, "Sail with Digital Intelligence - Metaverse Celebration of emlyon's 150th Anniversary & Outlook 2023 - Digital Intelligent Forum" was grandly held in the Convention and Exhibition Center of emlyon business school in Moverse, hosted by emlyon North China Alumni Association.

Prof. William Hua Wang, Associate Dean of emlyon business school and Dean of emlyon Asia, kicked off the celebration with a speech. And meanwhile, he sent a message to alumni with a famous saying of Roman Roland, a world-known French thinker and writer, "Life is like a running stream. There will be no beautiful waves without reefs."

emlyon Released the Research Findings of Digital Intelligence in 2022

Prof. Yeming Gong, Head of emlyon AIM Institute, Director of emlyon Business Intelligence Center and Professor of BUPT-emlyon GEMBA Program, published the research findings of digital intelligence on behalf of emlyon business school.

Insights from Prof. Yeming Gong

In terms of academic achievements, emlyon boasts world-leading research findings in hardware, software and systems of artificial intelligence, including computer science, automated control, robot algorithm, process and system engineering. In the aspect of management science, emlyon has conducted in-depth research at individual, organizational, cross-organizational and industrial levels, and accomplished remarkable results in psychology, sociology, organizational science, information economics and industrial organization theory.

Building on these research achievements, emlyon has empowered a number of application domains, including key fields and directions of smart logistics, smart manufacturing, smart energy, management of digital market techniques, intelligent FinTech, and AI and health engineering.

"The Door to the Metamorphosis of Digital Intelligence” - Metaverse's Infinite Imagination

Bingsen Wang, Secretary-General of emlyon North China Alumni Association, invited Prof. Xuecheng Yang, Professor of Management at Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications (BUPT) and Professor of BUPT-emlyon GEMBA Program, to a dialogue on "Digital Economy and Metaverse", and introduced Prof. Yang's latest study, "Metamorphosis 4 - Towards Metaverse with Digital and Reality Symbiosis".

Insights from Prof. Xuecheng Yang

Prof. Yang explored the "123" structure of metaverse in his publication about metamorphosis and metaverse. “1” refers to data, the basic element of metaverse. “2” represents two infrastructures of metaverse, namely "space" and "identity". And “3” indicates three ways of value creation in metaverse, i.e., "twin", "digital profitability" and "TheDAO".

Prof. Yang pointed out that metaverse can be regarded as an ultimate goal of the evolution of digital society, and in this context, the realization of "Digital and Reality Symbiosis". Meanwhile, he highlighted that the thinking of metaverse shall embark with "space" and "identity", without limited to the devices alone. The emergence of metaverse pushes the 2D Internet into a 3D system. "Once the cyberworld becomes three-dimensional, the way we acquire energy and create data will face earth-shaking changes." According to Prof. Yang, in order to create the prototype of metaverse, it is important to build technical infrastructure and regulate the social relations among data owners. In particular, the development of blockchain technology brings possibility to this "TheDAO" society.

He introduced the forward-looking concept of "two-way twinning" and explained that in the future, when technologies evolve rapidly and iteratively, the relationship between human and machines will become a fusion. Not only can we twin the physical world to the digital world, but we will also form a reverse digital world to twin the physical world. He took the artificial creation of a living body that can reproduce itself with biotechnology as an example to reveal the infinite possibilities of the future world. Furthermore, he asserted that metaverse is a collection and inevitable trend of digital technologies. In the era of metaverse, how to create one’s value and generate new data value while understanding a whole set of metaverse logic is a key issue that needs to be considered. The birth of metaverse is a response to the evolution of reality, which indicates that we will have a broader perspective in the future. Every entrepreneur needs to rethink how to adapt to "TheDAO" organizational structure and meet the future of infinite possibilities.

"emlyon Lion" was unveiled

In 2022, the Public Welfare Project Team of emlyon North China Alumni Association launched the digital public welfare project of "Starry Sky and Rainbow Initiative", which released a digital collectible - the electronic version of emlyon Lion, a public welfare figure carefully designed and produced by Michael Wang, a toy designer in New Zealand. The launch of this digital collectible + physical figure is also a gift for emlyon’s 150th anniversary.

"Outlook 2023 - Digital Intelligent Forum" inspired wonderful debates

Before the New Year's Eve, the "Outlook 2023" forum arrived as promised. This forum focused on three hotspot topics, namely "Digital Economy and Metaverse", "New Digital Healthcare" and "New Digital Retail". It was led by Prof. Sai Lan of emlyon business school along with dozens of industry experts and alumni, which brought wonderful debates to the participants.