Founder Group sponsors world-class contest in programming to cultivate more talents

Chinese technology conglomerate Founder Group stepped forward to serve as the diamond sponsor of a world-class programming contest held in Beijing last month as part of the company's vision to cultivate more talents in the computing science field.

The 42nd Association for Computing Machinery-International Collegiate Programming Contest, or ACM-ICPC, is one of the world's most influential annual college student computer competitions. It aims to give college students a stage to demonstrate their innovation and ability, and to learn teamwork and problem-solving skills.

The New York-headquartered ACM, its organizer, is the world's largest educational and scientific computing society, delivering resources that advance computing as a science and a profession. It provides the computing field's premier digital library and serves its members and the computing profession with leading-edge publications, conferences and career resources.

Since the yearly contest began in 1970, the sponsors have been global computing science monopolies such as IBM.

Eager to further deepen its influence in this field, Founder Group took over the sponsorship this year as a strong gesture to show the company's support to the ambitious students and the country's growing education sector.

It was also a gift to the Peking University, the host of the event during the university's 120th anniversary, as Founder Group was founded by the university in 1986.

After more than three decades of development, the Beijing-headquartered Founder Group has evolved into a diversified business structure maximizing industry synergy, with the core business segments of IT, healthcare, industry finance and an innovation center as its pillars. It currently has more than 35,000 employees.

"ACM-ICPC started in 1970 and has been hailed as the Olympics of computing science ever since," said Wang Yanglin, vice-president of Peking University. "The year of 2018 marks the 120th anniversary of Peking University and the event to be held in the university aims to promote the computing science education in China, inspire more students to get involved in the fields and provide the country with more talents under the country's call to develop artificial intelligence."

Wang also expressed his gratitude to Founder Group for the group's generosity in education.

"In recent years, the group has been actively practicing its social responsibility to boost the education development," said Sheng Yuhai, chairman of Founder Group. "Founder Group will, as it always does, make persistent efforts in pushing education forward and facilitating the integration of companies and education institutions."

"The university has been participating in the contest since 2010 with students from the department of mathematics and information science," said Huang Ru, an academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences. "The event provided a stage for the world's top programmers to showcase their skills in a fairground."

She said the contest plays a significant role in the progress of computing program teaching in recent years.

"Founder sponsored our first few contests within the university and two regional contests in Asia in 2004 and 2005, which has laid a solid ground for the university to be the host of this world-class contest," said Huang, who also is dean of the School of Electronic Engineering and Computer Science of Peking University

"When the university decided to host this year's ACMICPC final contest, Founder Group again stepped in to be the diamond sponsor," Huang said. "We hope this joint effort made between the Peking University and Founder Group will make this contest a successful one."

"The contest has a historical significance and is a milestone in the development of information science and computing science of Peking University," said Li Wenxin, vice-dean of the EECS school at Peking University.

"The fact that a Chinese company is sponsoring such an event is a reflection of the rapid development of the country's information industry," Li commented.