Microsoft Accelerator Beijing held a 2018 Open Day to welcome 17 startups selected to the company's latest acceleration program in Beijing on March 15.

Nearly 1,000 project applications have been collected from outstanding startups in 18 cities and regions of China, the United States and Japan since early December of 2017.

The 17 newly-joined enterprises, including MagicMed, MoBagel, HARB, Showboom, and YI Tunnel, are all artificial intelligence-oriented with experience in digitalization and intelligent upgrading of the retail industry.

Microsoft Accelerator Beijing holds a 2018 Open Day to welcome 17 startups selected to the company's latest acceleration program in Beijing on March 15. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

The Beijing accelerator program displayed the latest achievements of its innovation ecosystem on the open day, and plans to build an empathy platform with scientific and technological innovations to achieve collaborative sharing, horizontal learning, cross-border innovation and super cooperation among startups.

Tan Lin, CEO of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing, said, "We will add more humanistic ideas to our original thinking of science and technology and business innovation. We will build an empathetic innovation platform for individuals and companies with a more open and inclusive mindset."

Tan Lin, CEO of Microsoft Accelerator Beijing, talks about the company's empathetic innovation platform for individuals and companies. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Microsoft opened its first accelerator in China in July, 2012, based at Zhongguancun Science Park, China's first national innovation demonstration zone. The global initiative empowers entrepreneurs to build competitive companies with all kinds of resources and services in support.

So far, the Beijing accelerator has succeeded in incubating 231 startups in 10 groups, with a total value estimated at more than 50 billion yuan ($7.4 billion).

Seventeen startups are selected to Microsoft Accelerator Beijing's latest acceleration program in Beijing on March 15. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]