Innovator surges on with his dreams of the future

Liu Ruopeng describes himself as a “future designer”.[Photo provided to China Daily]

The media has dubbed Liu Ruopeng China's Elon Musk, the founder of Tesla Motors, because of their similar entrepreneurial streaks.

Liu, 32, has launched a dazzling range of products often seen in sci-fi movies, such as a jetpack that propels a person into space and body armor that helps increase physical strength.

He called himself a "dreamer" during an interview with China Daily after attending a sectoral conference that was addressed by President Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang in Beijing earlier.

"I'm an innovator who wants to change the world with the power of science and technology," says Liu, who has four listed companies.

He returned to China from the United States in 2009 and a year later set up his Shenzhen-based Kuang-Chi Institute of Advanced Technology in the southern Guangdong province.

The institute now has about 1,500 employees across the world.

A fan of the fantasy genre, he says his high-tech products are designed for the future just like in Hollywood films. "Our jetpack is similar to the one seen in Iron Man and our 'cloud' in Big Hero 6."

The "cloud" he talks about is a high-attitude balloon capable of sending Wi-Fi signals to millions of people.

Liu attributes his success to a futuristic approach.

"At first I figure out what we need in the future. Thereafter, I look for the technology sup-port that would be necessary to make them and finally I try to make the products," he says.

Liu and his fellow researchers made a splash in the scientific community in 2009 after they published an article on the invention of a Harry Potter-like cloak of invisibility in the Science journal.

He was then doing his PhD in electrical and computer engineering at Duke University in the US.

The cloak is made of meta-material that is created to deflect light on its surface.

Liu says the technology of metamaterial is at the core of some of his high-tech creations.