Tech giant Google is intensifying its drive into Artificial Intelligence (AI) by opening a research centre in China, even as its search services remain blocked in the country.
Google said the facility would be the first of its kind in Asia and would seek to employ indigenous talent. Adding that the research centre, which joins similar facilities in London, New York, Toronto and Zurich, will be run by a small team from its existing office in Beijing.
In a blog post on Google's website, the company said the new research centre was an important part of its mission as an "AI first company".
The Chief scientist at Google Cloud AI and Machine learning, Fei-Fei Li, said irrespective of AI advancing in Silicon Valley, Beijing or anywhere else in the world, it has the potential to better the lives of every person.
Research into artificial intelligence has the potential to improve a range of technologies, from self-driving cars and automated factories to translation products and facial recognition software.
Silicon Valley is focusing heavily on the future applications for AI.
China as a country has also pledged sturdy support for AI development and for catching up with the US.
But Google's search engine and a number of other services are banned in China. The country has imposed increasingly strict rules on foreign companies over the past year, including new censorship restrictions.
At the same it has been expanding its push into artificial intelligence.
A week ago, the country's President, Xi Jinping, urged senior officials at a key Communist Party meeting to "accelerate implementation of big data".
In July, China announced its national plan for AI, calling for the country to catch up with the US.
However, its advances in this area have sparked concerns. Human rights groups are among those troubled by China's use of artificial intelligence to monitor its own citizens.
