Chinese firms fight to lure top artificial intelligence talent from Silicon Valley

Before each job interview, Alex Ren offers the following advice to his clients to ensure their success: “Be humble and appreciate the opportunity to fully demonstrate your strength and what you can offer”.

The advice is not for potential employees. Rather, it is for Chinese technology companies trying to hire top-tier Silicon Valley talent in artificial intelligence (AI) in competition with the likes of Alphabet, Uber Technologies and Facebook.

“Chinese companies are obsessed with hiring Silicon Valley talent because winning talent here is like reaching the commanding heights of the AI battlefield,” said Ren, founder of TalentSeer, a San Francisco-based headhunting company focused on AI expert recruitment.

“The surging demand has pushed up salary packages for those experts, making the competition to lure AI talent much fiercer. That’s why I tell Chinese companies, especially those that are not very well known, they must fight for talent the way they fought for investors,” he said.

In the first quarter of this year Ren’s firm has received requests to fill 200 AI positions – half from Chinese firms and half from US firms – but can only fill four to five openings every month due to the shortage of talent.

Boasting the world’s largest internet market with 731 million web users, plus huge data processing needs and some of the biggest tech giants in the world, many Chinese firms see talent as their weak spot in the battle to surpass US counterparts as leaders in a wide range of sectors from autonomous driving to voice recognition.