WAIC 2026 Forum Releases AI Commercialization Report, Hailiang Tech Named to Industry Map and Top 50

The WAIC 2026 Corpus Innovation Forum officially opened on July 18 at the Shanghai World Expo Center's main venue, organized under the guidance of the World AI Conference Organizing Committee. The forum is one of only three high-level forums held at the main venue alongside the opening ceremony, signaling the importance of data infrastructure for the AI industry. During the event, organizers released the "From AI Corpus to Commercial Value Insights" report, along with the Global AI Industry Map and the China AI Commercial Application Value Top 50 list.

The Global AI Industry Map systematically charts the complete industry chain from computing infrastructure and LLM supply chains to AI commercialization tracks, while the Top 50 list evaluates domestic AI companies on their real-world business capabilities. The three main forums together outline 2026's full development trajectory: computing infrastructure, LLM supply chain, and next-generation AI commercialization.

Hailiang Tech Services was selected for both major achievements, recognized for its vertical AI technology and real-world deployment capabilities. The company appears in both the "Industry Applications" and "Vertical LLMs" sections of the industry map and made the Top 50 list alongside ZTE, Ant Group, Baosight Software, Momenta, and United Imaging Healthcare.

This year's WAIC, themed "Intelligent Partners, Co-creating the Future," marks a decisive shift away from parameter and computing power competition toward real-world industry applications. The report signals a clear message: the center of gravity in AI competition has moved from technical demonstrations to actual business deployment, with scenario adaptability, monetization capability, and real economic impact becoming the new benchmarks for evaluating AI companies.

The report identifies four major downstream AI application tracks in China: industrial manufacturing, financial services, public welfare, and consumer digitization. Public welfare AI — covering education, healthcare, government services, and elderly care — is highlighted as the most certain growth track due to rigid demand and stable policy support. Unlike general-purpose AI approaches, this sector presents high entry barriers including policy expertise, industry experience, proprietary vertical data, and long-term on-site service capabilities.

Notably, the education AI track has achieved a significant status upgrade in 2026, with the Global AI Industry Map classifying it as an independent first-level vertical track for the first time — on par with finance, industrial, communications, and transportation. China's Ministry of Education and four other departments previously issued an "AI + Education" action plan promoting deep integration across education scenarios. The industry map includes both international players like Khan Academy and Coursera alongside Chinese leaders including iFlytek, Hailiang Tech, Zuoyebang, and Squirrel AI.

As Zhejiang Province's first education technology unicorn, Hailiang Tech leverages over 30 years of physical school operations to standardize and scale AI deployment. The company integrates AI-powered classrooms, smart education management, teacher training, and governance into a unified "technology + service + outcomes" model, moving beyond single software or hardware delivery to long-term on-site operations. Its proprietary career development LLM is trained on hundreds of thousands of real student growth records, covering aptitude identification, academic diagnostics, and growth planning.

WAIC 2026 sends a clear industrial signal: deployable, sustainable business models are the ultimate vehicle for realizing AI's value. These two industry results provide both authoritative certification for quality companies and a clear reference path for vertical AI commercialization. As sectors like education AI continue to release high-certainty growth potential, China's AI industry is entering a new phase of high-quality scaled development.