Renowned AI Scientist and SenseTime Founder, Tang Xiao’ou, Passes Away

SenseTime, a leading Chinese AI firm, announced the passing of its founder and influential computer scientist, Tang Xiao’ou, in a statement released on Saturday.

In the online post, SenseTime expressed deep sorrow, stating, “It is with an extremely heavy heart that we announce to everyone the sorrowful news: Our beloved founder, Tang Xiao’ou, due to an illness that could not be treated, left us forever at 23:45 on December 15, 2023.”

Tang, who founded SenseTime in 2014, was an alumnus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a former professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. He was in his mid-fifties at the time of his passing.

The specific cause of Tang’s death, a renowned computer scientist, was not disclosed.

In 2019, SenseTime faced scrutiny as it was placed on a United States trade blacklist, accused of being an arm of China’s “military-industrial complex” for its technology’s use in mass surveillance in Xinjiang. Subsequently, the firm’s initial public offering in Hong Kong was delayed in December 2021 due to new restrictions imposed by the US, though it eventually listed successfully before the year ended.

In its statement on Saturday, SenseTime hailed Tang as “an outstanding representative in China’s AI field,” describing him as “knowledgeable, rigorous in scholarship, truth-seeking and pragmatic.” The firm also highlighted the enduring inspiration from Tang’s company mission, stating, “the company mission he formulated, to ‘insist on originality and let AI lead human progress’ will inspire all SenseTime people.”

Tang’s extensive experience in American academia includes earning a PhD from MIT in 1996 following an MSc at the University of Rochester in 1991. AFP