iQIYI CTO Liu Wenfeng Speaks at Hong Kong FILMART: Technology Empowers Upgrade of iQIYI’s Content Innovation and User Experience

BEIJING, Aug. 31, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — iQIYI Inc. (NASDAQ: IQ) (“iQIYI” or the “Company”), an innovative market-leading online entertainment service in China, is pleased to announce that the Company’s Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Liu Wenfeng, participated in the 24^th Hong Kong International Film and Television Market (FILMART) on August 28. At a panel at the event titled “Focusing on the Future of Entertainment and Science and Technology”, Liu spoke about how iQIYI is empowering its entertainment ecosystem through the use of artificial intelligence (AI) and other cutting-edge technologies and their roles in the Company’s global expansion.

The event, which is also known as Hong Kong FILMART, ran from August 26 to 29 and was held online this year amid the Covid-19 pandemic. The four-day virtual content marketplace brought together more than 670 exhibitors from 38 countries and regions, promoting nearly 2,000 film and television production to potential buyers worldwide. 

Technology empowers content innovation and user experience upgrade

iQIYI has long explored the relationships between technology, content and audience experience and in recent years, the application of AI in the fields of vision, voice, and natural language has rapidly developed, putting those relationships under the spotlight in the entertainment industry. “As a technology-based entertainment company, we are committed to providing users with enriched content and premium viewing experiences through new technologies. Advanced technologies such as AI serves as the driving force behind our user-centric entertainment service platform, enabling us to explore innovative forms for content creation, distribution and monetization,” said Liu.

iQIYI has applied AI technology to various aspects of its business including content creation, production, distribution and monetization. For the creation of professional content, iQIYI utilizes AI technologies to analyze performances of actors taken from iQIYI’s massive content library and provides suggestions to casting directors when they are looking for actors by intelligent casting algorithms. Casting directors can use the AI technologies to search and retrieve past performances of target actors from the massive content library, helping highly improve the efficiency during the casting process.

To further improve user experience, iQIYI also launched Qiguan, an AI innovative application product that supports instant recognition and search of video footage. Using AI technology, Qiguan can continuously analyze video content and identify celebrities, cartoon characters, background music and lines in the video to help create an immersive and interactive viewing experience for users. In addition, iQIYI introduced a multi-perspective watching mode for its self-produced variety show Youth With You Season 2. This new feature, powered by iQIYI’s AI angle-switching technology, allows users to simultaneously watch the performance of the over 100 trainees from a view of the whole stage and a separate view that focuses on their favorite trainee. It creates a more personalized and immersive viewing experience, and can deliver a smooth streaming performance on all high, mid- to low-end devices as the capabilities of iQIYI video player is optimized for better adaption.

Technological innovation is one of key competitiveness to iQIYI conquering the international market

After cementing its leading position in the domestic Chinese market through its strong capabilities across technology, content creation and business operations, iQIYI has set its sights on conquering overseas markets. Liu said that iQIYI is attaching greater importance to applying innovative technologies in its overseas expansion, seeing them as one of key competitiveness that will allow the Company to stand out in the global arena.

iQIYI officially commenced its global expansion in June 2019 when it released the international version of the iQIYI App. Five months later, the Company entered into a strategic partnership with Astro, a leading media brand in Malaysia, to kickstart local operations. In addition to its high-quality films and drama series, iQIYI also provides tailored content for local markets as well as technology services such as Qisubo, the Company’s latest developed content delivery network (CDN). Qisubo provides users with the ultimate video-watching experience across different devices such as mobile phones, OTT and virtual reality in a wide range of network settings. Qisubo’s edge computing and storage capabilities can reduce cloud data transfer and locally process video content, allowing overseas iQIYI users to get high-quality content faster and more consistently. To date, content in Blu-ray 1080P and 4K quality have been made available to users in Thailand and Burma on Qisubo.  

“iQIYI aspires to continue accelerating the innovation of content creation, user experience and monetization mode with the dual drivers of cutting-edge technology and high-quality entertainment production, and striving to provide users with a rich variety of viewing forms and interactive content to build a new entertainment ecosystem for iQIYI,” Liu said. 

About iQIYI, Inc.

iQIYI, Inc. is an innovative market-leading online entertainment service in China. Its corporate DNA combines creative talent with technology, fostering an environment for continuous innovation and the production of blockbuster content. iQIYI’s platform features highly popular original content, as well as a comprehensive library of other professionally-produced content, partner-generated content and user generated content. The Company distinguishes itself in the online entertainment industry by its leading technology platform powered by advanced AI, big data analytics and other core proprietary technologies. iQIYI attracts a massive user base with tremendous user engagement, and has developed a diversified monetization model including membership services, online advertising services, content distribution, live broadcasting, online games, IP licensing, online literature and e-commerce.

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SOURCE iQIYI, Inc.