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Shenzhen will host the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit (APEC) in November 2026, particularly given its reputation as China’s Silicon Valley and a global hub for artificial intelligence and embodied intelligence. The city will showcase its advanced industrial ecosystem in robotics, new vehicles, and the digital economy, aiming to connect markets and economies across the Asia-Pacific region. Shenzhen’s innovation model, designed to link China with Asia and the Pacific, is a key priority for the APEC Summit, scheduled to be held in Shenzhen this year under the theme Building an Asia-Pacific Community for Shared Prosperity. This theme focuses on integrating the Chinese economy regionally and globally through advanced technology. Therefore, Shenzhen’s focus during the APEC 2026 Summit will be on innovation, the digital economy, and showcasing new productive forces. The meetings and discussions at the APEC 2026 Summit will be concentrated in Shenzhen. The conference aims to highlight the role of innovation and advanced digital technologies; promote regional cooperation in artificial intelligence, innovation, and digital technologies; and strengthen industrial networks and cross-border supply chains for APEC economies in the semiconductor and green technology sectors. This explains why Shenzhen, China, was chosen to host the upcoming APEC conference. It serves as a living example, showcasing Shenzhen as a model of sustainable smart cities that rely on AI algorithms in the transportation, healthcare, and services sectors.

Shenzhen is at the forefront of the regional and international AI landscape, acting as a new engine for industry by integrating digital innovation to expand markets and improve production in the Asia-Pacific region. In Shenzhen, any new idea can find the necessary components within 30 minutes, leading entrepreneurs to call this speed a Shenzhen Speed. Shenzhen is a unique global model for rapid innovation and integrated supply chains, enabling entrepreneurs to transform ideas into prototypes in just 30 minutes thanks to the integration of industrial components, a phenomenon known as “Shenzhen Speed.”   Shenzhen’s innovation environment is characterized by a seamless supply chain, where markets and factories provide all the necessary hardware and electronics components in one place, supporting entrepreneurship. The city offers an incubator environment for startups and innovators from around the world. Furthermore, its regional connectivity mechanism reinforces Shenzhen’s role as a major hub for trade and technology cooperation in the Asia-Pacific region.

Shenzhen, often called China’s Silicon Valley, is a leading global center for innovation, technology, and rapid industrial development. The city is spearheading the transformation into a smart city by integrating AI governance, the Internet of Things, and ultra-fast supply chains that enable the realization of technological ideas in record time. Embodied AI is a modern industrial trend in the city, alongside artificial intelligence. Shenzhen’s position is further solidified in technological innovation; Shenzhen’s rapid pace allows the city to provide the components for any new technological idea in just 30 minutes thanks to its massive supply chains. Furthermore, it serves as an incubator for major companies, housing the headquarters of China’s leading technology giants, such as Huawei, Tencent, DJI, and Wipertek. Shenzhen acts as a base for major companies, hosting thousands of large and emerging firms in artificial intelligence and robotics. The city is a natural hub for embodied intelligence, humanoid robot manufacturing, and smart factory applications powered by industrial AI models. This makes Shenzhen a true embodiment of digital urban leadership. It has been crowned a smart city thanks to its 5G infrastructure and dual digital models.

Shenzhen embodies the engine of Chinese technological excellence and its transformation from a port  From a small fishing ground to a leading global innovation hub, Shenzhen is not only driving the engines of modern technology but also, alongside its massive supply chains, is propelling industry and progress in the region through artificial intelligence and embodied intelligence. The city is renowned for its so-called Shenzhen Speed, where any new technological idea can find its components and factories in just 30 minutes. Shenzhen plays a significant role in driving innovation and connecting the Asia-Pacific. This will be reflected in the priorities of the APEC Summit in November 2026, hosted by Shenzhen, which aims to stimulate regional cooperation in artificial intelligence and innovation; address global economic challenges, slow growth, and rising trade protectionism by promoting integration and unity; and achieve sustainable development and create an environment conducive to innovation. This will be accomplished through the integration of ministerial efforts and related events to encourage innovation in the Asia-Pacific region.

The Chinese city of Shenzhen is a unique example of a rapid transformation from a small fishing village to a global hub for technology and innovation. Today, it leads advanced sectors such as artificial intelligence (AI), augmented intelligence (AI), and massive supply chains, becoming a driving force for technological excellence in China and the world. The key drivers of Shenzhen’s success lie in understanding its historical transformation from a simple fishing port to a leading global center for business, technology, and AI, as well as its ability to innovate by integrating AI algorithms across various industrial and service sectors and by developing augmented intelligence. Shenzhen is heavily investing in robotics and intelligent systems that physically interact with their environment, providing the world with the necessary supply chains to meet its technological needs. This is made possible by Shenzhen’s vast and flexible infrastructure for manufacturing and developing technological devices at breakneck speed.

  Finally, Shenzhen stands out as a pilot city in China, particularly in the areas of artificial intelligence (AI) and embodied intelligence (EQI). Shenzhen aims to become a national base for developing and implementing large-scale linguistic models (LCMs) and advanced AI and EQI products, integrating robots and intelligent systems into real-world and industrial environments, thus driving high-quality manufacturing forward. Furthermore, Shenzhen plays a key role in promoting smart governance by relying on AI-based solutions for efficient traffic management, security, and urban services.

SEATTLE — Growing up the son of an NFL wide receiver, Alex Freeman said he felt a lot of pressure to play the American version of football, not the one the rest of the world plays.

“I always got asked if football was the path,” he said last summer. “But I always had a secret love for soccer.”

And he had to keep it a secret because he wasn’t sure his father Antonio, a Super Bowl winner with the Green Bay Packers, would understand.

But his stepfather did. Jake Hinkle introduced Alex to the sport and served as his first coach while his mother Rochelle urged him on.

Now his biological father, who last played in 2004, the year his son was born, has joined the cheering section as well.

“I was with him at the hotel,” Freeman said, “and he was just giving me those kinds of speeches that you hear from a dad. He’s just telling me to be myself. I think he knows that being myself has gotten me to this point. So why change that, right?”

Instead he put a massive exclamation mark on what has been a breakout 13 months by setting up Gio Reyna for the final goal of a 4-1 win for the U.S. in its World Cup opener against Paraguay. The U.S. returns to group play Friday in Seattle where it will face Australia, with the winner of the match taking the inside track toward advancing to the knockout rounds as the group champion.

Much of that still sounds like a dream to Freeman, who was playing for Orlando City’s reserve team in MLS Next Pro during the last World Cup. He wasn’t in the national team’s plans this time around either until coach Mauricio Pochettino called him in for an audition last year, something Freeman called a big surprise.

U.S. defender Alex Freeman kicks the ball over Paraguay forward Antonio Sanabria during the second half of a World Cup group stage match on June 12.

(Kelvin Kuo / Los Angeles Times)

But Freeman earned his first international start less than three weeks later, then played all but three minutes of the Americans’ six-game run through the Gold Cup, the team’s last competitive tournament before the World Cup.

Since joining the national team, Freeman has appeared in 17 consecutive matches and has become the ninth-youngest American to start a World Cup game.

Freeman, 21, is the youngest player on a young team, the second-youngest roster the U.S. has sent to a World Cup in more than three decades. That just doesn’t bode well for the future — it’s paying off in the present, too.

Reyna is on his second World Cup team at 23. Folarin Balogun, 24, had two goals in the U.S. opener, becoming the first American to score multiple times in a World Cup game in 96 years. And Chris Richards, 26, completed all 83 of his passes in the opener, the most without a miss by a World Cup player since 1966.

With an average age of 26.8 years, the U.S. is the fifth-youngest team in the World Cup. Leave captain Tim Ream, 38, out of the equation and only Ivory Coast and Ecuador have younger rosters.

Pochettino is being rewarded for giving those young players a chance, with five players making their World Cup debuts against Paraguay.

“He has this ability to find the potential [of] the young players and he is not scared to give them the responsibility to put them on the field,” LAFC goalkeeper Hugo Lloris, who played for Pochettino at Tottenham, told CBS Sports. “I can see a lot of coaches protecting themselves and try[ing] to not take that risk with the young players. But he’s not this kind of coach. If the young player deserve[s], he will be on the field.”

With Freeman, Pochettino broke with tradition in another way. Many national team coaches won’t call up players who aren’t starting for their club team, but Freeman has played more games and minutes with the U.S. this year than he has with Villarreal, the Spanish team he joined in January after appearing in only 32 MLS games with Orlando City.

The coach explained himself by saying he was choosing the “right 26” players for the World Cup, not the best 26. And Freeman fits Pochettino’s need for a defender who can transition seamlessly between a back three and back four, allowing the U.S. to play the kind of dynamic style the coach prefers.

If questions about his presence on the team have left him feeling slighted, Freeman says he’s fueled more by the adversity he has faced than by his recent success.

“Knowing that I’ve been in different environments, different situations, it’s how can I be consistently good, consistently solid, consistently making a difference?” he said. “Especially now in the World Cup, in another different environment. It’s how can I consistently help my team?”

A decade after making a clean break from football to play fútbol, Freeman says he has no regrets.

“I had to pick,” he said. “And soccer was the clear choice by far.”

Even his father, with whom he remains close, recently admitted as much, telling his son that playing in a World Cup beats winning a Super Bowl.

“Absolutely,” the younger Freeman said. “Seeing it now, especially throughout the last year I’ve been with the national team, knowing that it’s a different type of competition, it’s a different type of atmosphere? For sure.”