Call for the Global Internet Competition of "Straight to Wuzhen"

The 2025 edition of the "Straight to Wuzhen" Global Internet Competition, a signature event of the World Internet Conference (WIC) Wuzhen Summit, is now officially open for project submissions.

Now in its seventh year, the competition continues to serve as a global platform for digital innovation and cooperation. By bringing together internet projects, technology teams, startups, academic institutions, and investors, the initiative promotes the development of emerging technologies, strengthens global industry collaboration, and supports the growth of the digital economy.

The competition encourages high-quality connections between technology and capital, promotes entrepreneurial vitality, and helps cultivate new quality productive forces.

Institutions and individuals from around the world are invited to participate, including research institutes, universities, developer communities, enterprises and startups.

Theme of the 2025 Competition

Discovering Future's Emerging Forces, Collaborating on New Digital Ecology. 

Organizers

The event is organized by the WIC and the People's Government of Zhejiang Province.

It is hosted by the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Economy and Information Technology, the Cyberspace Administration of Zhejiang Province, the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Science and Technology, the Jiaxing Municipal People's Government, and the Tongxiang Municipal People's Government.

Competition Tracks and Participation Requirements

The 2025 Competition features six key tracks: Artificial Intelligence, Intelligent Connected Mobility,  Intelligent Digital  Healthcare, Intelligent Manufacturing, Smart Terminal, and Open Source Projects.

1. Projects must fall within one of the six designated tracks.

2

Participants must be legally registered entities in good standing. 

For the Open Source Projects track, participants may be individual developers or teams from enterprises, research institutions and universities.

3

Participating entities must hold the intellectual property rights to their submitted projects. All entries must comply with relevant national laws and regulations and must not infringe on any third-party intellectual property rights. Projects found to be in violation of these requirements will be disqualified.

4

All submitted materials must be complete and accurate. Participating entities are required to sign a declaration of authenticity. Any falsified information will lead to immediate disqualification.

5

The Organizing Committee will publish competition results on the WIC's official website and related platforms, and results will be subject to public supervision.

Competition Schedule

The competition will take place in three phases: the online preliminary, the semi-final, and the final.

1. The Online Preliminaries

In the online preliminaries, projects will be solicited globally across all tracks through the official website of the WIC. Expert judges will conduct online evaluations. For submissions from China, 20 projects per track will be selected to advance to the semi-finals. For international submissions, 10 to 12 projects will be selected from each competition site based on comprehensive assessment.

2. The Semi-Finals

The semi-finals will be held in both Chinese and overseas regions. The semi-finals on the Chinese mainland will take place in cities including Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Hangzhou, Wuhan, and Chongqing.

The North American and European semi-finals are planned to be held online, while the Asia-Pacific semi-final is planned to be held offline in either Singapore or China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.

3. The Final and Supporting Events

The final will be held one to three days prior to the opening of the 2025 WIC Wuzhen Summit. Both domestic and international projects will compete on the same stage, with international teams having the option to participate online.

A series of supporting events will be held during the Wuzhen Summit, including the "Wings of Digital" Innovation Night and meetings with investment institutions.

4. Awards Ceremony

The awards ceremony is scheduled to take place in Wuzhen on the final day of the Wuzhen Summit. Winners across all tracks will be announced.

Registration

Participants may register their projects via the WIC's official website at https://wicinternet.org by navigating to the "Events" section and selecting "Straight to Wuzhen Competition".

Project submission can also be done at
https://gicreg.wicwuzhen.cn/conf_competition/register 

Registration Deadline: 24:00 (Beijing Time, UTC+8), July 31, 2025.

Contact Information

For questions regarding registration or partnership inquiries, please contact: 

Chen Fangyuan
Tel: +86 (0571) 8522 8836
Mobile: +86 189 6818 0387

Gao Baoyi
Tel: +86 (0571) 8522 9038
Mobile: +86 138 6718 6525

Ye Litao
Mobile: +86 152 5883 7563