Entrepreneurs can illuminate a brighter future, today

Days ago, I joined robots to dance, shoot hoops and perform sanda (Chinese kickboxing) in Beijing's E-Town.

Later, I put on AR glasses that instantaneously translated languages. Then, I donned a halo of brain wave sensors that lit up a galaxy of digital stars on a screen as I concentrated.

Next, I literally leapt into an AI world, where I met E-Town's first official "AI idol", Koko, "face to face" while filming a video for China Daily's Tales and Trails series.

Beijing's Central Axis has served as the backbone of a city that has stood tall for centuries. But in the past week, I've also discovered that this spine is tingling with the pulse of an emerging energy powered by technology.

I've called this ancient city home for 20 years.

But just days ago, I found a new Beijing that isn't just moving into the future — it has already arrived.

It's a particularly exciting time and place to be an entrepreneur.

Soon after these encounters with some of the country's top tech, I took the stage as a speaker at the Zhongguancun Forum — the nation's premier annual technology event, held in "China's Silicon Valley" — to talk about youth entrepreneurship in the city.

In Beijing, entrepreneurs can enjoy many advantages, from incubators to the 12345 citizen-service hotline.

A couple of years ago, my family was featured in Hotline Beijing — China's third most-viewed documentary ever. I've since called 12345 for assistance with everything from medical insurance and schooling to taxes. I hope more people can learn that it goes beyond merely resolving complaints to also answering questions. Demonstrating inclusivity, it offers services in several languages and alternative communication modes for people with disabilities like hearing loss. And it has developed services specifically to help entrepreneurs.

Youth entrepreneurship is ultimately what led me to Beijing as a new graduate two decades ago.

I was selected to intern at China Daily in 2005, largely because I'd founded and operated my own regional newspaper in the US from ages 18 to 22.

Back then, I never imagined that, after volunteering in the Wenchuan (Sichuan province) and Yushu (Qinghai province) quake zones, I'd go on to found a volunteer initiative on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in 2011, as a new expression of the entrepreneurial spirit.

I often say, "Sichuan taught me to find light in the darkness. Qinghai taught me to create light where there seemed to be none — literally."

We started by installing solar panels in every primary school in Yushu's Qumarleb county — an area the size of Switzerland and the Netherlands combined — bringing electricity to thousands of children whose schools previously lacked power.

Back then, I saw a dire need and thought, "Somebody should do something about that."

Then I thought, "I'm somebody."

We later provided these schools' first computers, WiFi, clothes, food, medicine, libraries — and even yaks.

China's development miracle has since solved these "hardware" issues. So, our group today instead provides full university scholarships for nomadic youth and surgeries for herder children with disabilities.

I don't make money from this — instead, I spend my own on it.

But not all wealth is financial. Perhaps the greatest riches are spiritual.

They say about money, "You can't take it with you."

This investment in thousands of children who will outlive me — that light will outshine my life.

To the young entrepreneurs in Beijing and beyond, established or aspiring, successful or struggling, I hope you can also find and create your own light to brighten our shared future.

There's a lot to be done. Somebody needs to do it.

And you — you are somebody.