Foreign Exhibitors "Fly In" with One-Click Booth Registration, AWE "One Exhibition, Two Zones" Unlocks More Hard Tech

On-site teaching on “shrimp farming” how to avoid risks, and live demonstrations of humanoid robots competing during the Spring Festival Gala… The AWE held for the first time at the Oriental Hub not only keeps pace with cutting-edge consumer technology but also makes many foreign exhibitors say it’s very convenient to attend.

“We came directly to the exhibition hall after getting off the plane, and we don’t need a Chinese visa,” said two foreign exhibitors pulling luggage on the way to the exhibition.

As one of the world’s three major expos, the 2026 China Appliance and Consumer Electronics Expo (AWE2026), which opened on the 12th, debuted a new “one exhibition with two zones” model, spanning the Shanghai New International Expo Center and the Shanghai Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone.

Zhao Yugang, Deputy Director of the Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone Management Bureau, explained that overseas visitors with an invitation registration certificate can enter the zone without a Chinese visa; for high-level exhibitions like consumer electronics with many domestic and international attendees and diverse exhibits, they will continue to optimize various convenience measures, especially dynamically optimizing entry and exit routes, providing appointment services for border visa processing, launching fast-track clearance measures after pre-approval of departure and entry, and policies facilitating the entry and exit of goods and exhibits, providing comprehensive support services for large-scale exhibitions.

The two exhibition zones, with different focuses, feature the New International Exhibition Zone concentrating on “AI + Ecology,” while the Oriental Hub represents cutting-edge core technology, showcasing the latest breakthroughs in consumer electronics productivity. Both zones highlight China’s latest technological innovations.

This January, Shanghai-based companies TianShu ZhiXin (09903.HK) and XiYu Technology (MiniMax, 00100.HK), which listed on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, brought their latest products.

Staff at TianShu ZhiXin’s booth told First Financial that the company is showcasing three core product series—TianGai, ZhiKai, and TongYang—building an integrated cloud-edge-end computing power matrix that precisely covers all scenarios for AI model training, inference, and edge deployment.

Among them, the TianShu TongYang edge computing terminal TY1200 addresses three major pain points of OpenClaw applications—complex installation, high token billing costs, and privacy security risks. “The product can be deployed locally, the network cannot read local data, and there’s no need to worry about token billing pressure. It won’t drain your bank card overnight, balancing privacy security and operational efficiency.”

MiniMax displayed its latest generation of multimodal self-developed models and product family. According to staff, their programming model MiniMax M2.5 fully meets top global standards in programming and tool invocation scenarios. It topped the global model aggregation platform OpenRouter just a week after release, with a weekly token consumption of over 3.07 trillion, ranking first worldwide. In the video field, Hailuo video models have helped create over 600 million high-quality videos globally. Additionally, voice and music models were showcased in the MiniMax hall, along with China’s first full-stack general intelligent agent, MiniMax Agent.

MiniMax Vice President Yan Yijun said, “AWE2026’s large international stage provides the best opportunity for us to showcase our full-stack AI business ecosystem and multimodal ecosystem.”

Another Shanghai GPU company, MuXi Co., Ltd. (688802.SH), displayed the Xisuo X206 scientific intelligent GPU. The X206 features the MXMACA software stack, which, combined with MuXi’s scientific computing platform, efficiently supports classic scientific computing tasks such as meteorological and oceanic numerical forecasting and computational fluid dynamics, as well as AI4S-driven life sciences and quantum computing frontier research paradigms.

In the most popular embodied intelligence field, besides companies like Zhiyuan and Fourier, the national humanoid robot innovation platform GuoDi Center focuses on key technologies for humanoid robots and embodied intelligence research, bringing the “Linglong-h” general semi-human platform. This platform is designed for lightweight data collection and logistics sorting, with a seven-degree-of-freedom bionic robotic arm that greatly improves data collection efficiency and effectively addresses the industry’s high data costs.

According to Xu Dongsheng, Vice Chairman of the China Household Electrical Appliances Association, the Oriental Hub exhibition zone will host more than 20 forums and supporting activities, such as the Young Leaders Entrepreneurs Forum, Silver Economy and AI Medical Seminar, covering key areas like smart glasses and VR products, smart terminals and semiconductors, ultra-high-definition audiovisual industries, electronic circuits, automotive chips, industrial chain collaboration, and international trade investment and financing. These activities systematically present technological evolution trends, industrial development paths, and practical applications. Additionally, companies like JD.com 3D Printing, Lisan Technology, Youwei Health Tech, Guangli Technology, Ninebot, Xiaodu Tech, Xiaomi Tech, Aoshuai Smart, and Weitai Tech will hold new product launches.

At a previous press conference, Zhao Yugang introduced that the zone is planning to build innovation centers such as sci-tech R&D incubation bases, medical device training, display, trading, and innovation centers to support the development of key industries like biomedicine, integrated circuits, and artificial intelligence. Thanks to policies facilitating international personnel entry and import tax exemptions for equipment, companies can efficiently collaborate with international R&D teams, conduct technical exchanges, joint innovation, and results transformation. Leveraging service industry opening-up policies, companies can explore innovations in offshore trade, service trade, and digital trade. “The International Business Cooperation Zone is not only a hub for international business exchanges but will also become a magnet for frontier industry development. Combining the cutting-edge technologies and innovations showcased at the Consumer Electronics Show, the zone will strengthen its technological innovation functions and promote key industry growth.”