Global Times Exclusive: Computing power has become a new productive force, driving digitalization across industries at an unprecedented speed. The Strategy Advisory Committee (SAC) is an advisory organization to the Global Computing Consortium (GCC), and plays a vital role in computing technology innovation and applications.

GCC Council Advisor Academician Hong Mei presenting Academician Wen Gao the letter of invitation for the GCC SAC Chair

At the 2025 Computing Global Conference in Shenzhen on January 10, 2025, the GCC announced the invitation to Wen Gao, Academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, to serve as Chair of the GCC SAC. As an advisory organization, the SAC aims to gather the world's top-level wisdom, provide high-end, professional, and forward-looking strategic guidance for the development of GCC, and promote the innovation and sustainable development of the global computing industry.

In his exclusive interview with the Global Times, Gao pointed out that computing power is now in the best period of opportunity in history, adding that computing power represents productivity.

In his response to the comments froma documentarythatChina Media Group aired on December 28, 2024, that "computing power is a national strength, representing a new productive force for the digital economy and a major cornerstone of national and community development based on digital technologies", Gao refers to computing power networks as a powerful tool that can efficiently channel computing power and schedule it towards rapid consumption, while stressing that SAC will play a critical role in streamlining the complex relations of production, like these between training and inference, to ensure the efficient use of computing power. Gao continued to call for all relevant parties, governments and enterprises alike, to make greater efforts to tackle common technological challenges and bring computing power to more use cases. "Until there are specific use cases across industries, GCC won't be able to play a bigger role," said Gao.

"I see SAC as a brain trust of GCC," said Gao of how he will position this committee. "Our goal is to pool wisdom from all over the world to provide professional and forward-looking strategies for GCC. We will build an all-inclusive advisory team, encompassing research institutions, enterprises, users, and industry representatives, so that we can focus not only on research and theory, but also extensive practices across industries, in the context of innovation and sustainability within the GCC."

GCC was inaugurated on June 26, 2024. It is the first Chinese international industry and standards organization for computing, envisioning "the development of state-of-the-art computing for a digital and intelligent society through openness, innovation, and collaboration". It is tasked with bringing the benefits of computing power to all by building a robust ecosystem that drives sustainable growth.

In a computing-powered era, computing power has seen rising competition globally. However, this does not discourage Gao's confidence in the future of GCC. "GCC is in a spot with both challenges and opportunities. SAC will provide GCC with strategic advice in line with industry trends, research and studies, and technical breakthroughs. We will also focus on advising industry policies and building industry consensus," Gao explained.

GCCwill focus on architecture, standardization, ecosystem, and application to promote new computing paradigms. It will dedicate its efforts to fostering the incubation and application of new technologies and building a comprehensive ecosystemcoveringfrom theoretical research to consensus promotion, standardization, and application. Also, it will promote collaborative innovation and converged development with other industries, aiming to develop globally competitive computing clusters. To reach this end, talent and global cooperation are necessary. Therefore, GCC has already set out to work on a global talent cultivation system to help cultivate high-quality computing professionals, and strengthen international cooperation in the global computing industry landscape to ensure a robust prosperity.