Robin Li
Chinese Name Li
Yanhong. Independent
politician.
Founder, chairman
and CEO of Baidu.
Also patent holder of
a system of Hyperlink Analysis technology,
which is
one of the important inventions that shaped what the search technology is nowedays.
Robin Li
was born in November
1968 in Shanxi and graduated from
Peking University in
1991. Recieved his
Master's degree in
computer science
from the State
University of New
York in Buffalo, in 1994.
Has served as
a senior consultant
at Dow Jones &
Company, then the
real-time financial
information system
designer at The Wall
Street Journal web
version and Senior
Engineer at Infoseek
in Silicon Valley.
In January 2000,
Robin returned to
China and founded
Baidu.
Educational Background
Robin had been
fascinated by opera
in primary school
and had been
accepted by the
Shanxi Yangquan Jin
Opera Troupe. But in
high school, he realized the
importance of
knowledge and
studied very hard.
In 1987, Robin was admitted to
Peking University as
an Information
Management major,
with the highest
score in his city.
Beginning his junior
year, he realized that the
United States was
ahead in the
computer field and
decided to study
computer science in
the United States
after graduation.
In 1991, Robin was accepted into
the computer science
department at the
State University of
New York at Buffalo.
After a year at
school, he had
a chance to get an
internship at
Panasonic in Japan.
Per Robin, the three
month plus
internship played a
crucial role in his
later career
choices.
Employment History
Before the summer
break of 1994, Robin
went to work for
a Dow Jones
subsidiary on Wall
Street.
For three and a half
years on Wall
Street, Robin Li
worked as a senior
adviser to this Dow
Jones subsidiary,
and then the designer of
the Wall Street
Journal's online
version of the real-time financial
information system.
In 1997, Robin left Wall Street for
INFOSEEK, the
leading search
engine in Silicon
Valley.
Baidu Career
In 1999, Robin Li,
who had been back to
visit China annually
in last five years,
found China's
Internet landscape
is changing
dramatically during
his eight years
abroad. He realized
that China's
Internet environment
was just at the
right time, he then
made one of the most
important decisions
in his life- quit
his job in Silicon
Valley.
In January 2000,
Robin and his good
friend Mr. Xu Yong,
rented two rooms in
the Peking
University Resources
Hotel and founded
Baidu with the
"hyperlink analysis"
patent as the
Technical
Foundation, and ONLY
$1.2 million in the
first venture
capital round.
Luckily, nine months
later, they got
another $10 million
from venture capital
firm DFJ PARTNERS
IDG.
In 2001, Robin made another most
important decision
in his life- to
persuade
shareholders to turn
Baidu into an
independent search
engine for end-users, and
implemented a
"lightning project"
to upgrade Baidu's
technology. The
decision ultimately
made Baidu the
second largest
independent search
engine in the world
today, and the
dominator among
Chinese search
engines.
In August 2005,
Baidu successfully
listed on Nasdaq,
becoming one of the most closely watched listed companies in the global capital
market. And Robin, thus became one of the richest men in China.
In 2013, Robin built China's first
deep learning
institute on Baidu,
becoming the first
Chinese and global
entrepreneur to push
the frontiers of
artificial
intelligence (Baidu
AI).
In 2015, Robin called for the
establishment of a
"Chinese brain"
project at the
national level, with
artificial
intelligence as the
core to seize the
commanding heights
of a new round of
scientific and
technological
revolution.
On January 19, 2018,
Robin appeared on
The cover of Time
Magazine's first
issue of 2018,
dubbed "The
Innovator, "
becoming The first
Chinese Internet
entrepreneur being
there
and named
"helping China win
in The 21st century.
".