In November 2023 Guangxi began to emerge as a center for advanced virtual-human technology. Guangxi Huzhen Technology Co., Ltd. (广西互珍科技有限公司), a Nanning-based startup, was identified as developing ultra-realistic virtual humans, for example showcasing lifelike avatars in its MoBao livestreaming app. In May 2024, Sanjiang Dong Autonomous County introduced its first Dong-ethnic digital human at a Beijing cultural-tourism promotion event. This computer-generated Dong villager, modeled in traditional attire and capable of interactive dialogue, was unveiled to represent Sanjiang’s heritage and tourism resources.
In October 2024 two local government projects rolled out their inaugural digital-human services. On 17 October 2024 the city of Baise unveiled its first government-service “digital person” at the Baise Government Service Center. Developed with Huawei Cloud AI technology, this animated virtual attendant can engage in natural voice dialog and answer over a thousand citizens’ questions about bureaucratic procedures, enabling an intelligent guide-service at the service center. In the same month, on 25 October 2024, the Xiangzhou County Federation of Trade Unions (象州县总工会) in Laibin introduced a union-service virtual assistant named “Xiaohui”. Xiaohui is a digital union worker combining highly realistic CGI with advanced language models; it can interact with workers to explain union benefits, legal rights and procedural questions, drawing from tens of thousands of union-related knowledge entries. These deployments demonstrate Guangxi’s efforts to apply digital-human technology in public services.
In November 2024 researchers at Guangxi University in Nanning published studies on virtual influencers, showing that hyper-realistic and cartoon-style avatars significantly increased Gen-Z consumers’ purchase intentions compared to medium-realism images. This academic work highlighted how realism level of virtual characters can affect consumer behavior in livestream shopping.
In January 2025 the national oil company Sinopec (中国石化) launched its first AI fueling assistant employee, deploying it simultaneously at over 40 service stations including the Xinyang gas station in Nanning. This “AI digital employee” appears on a large screen at the pump, guiding customers (“I want to add 95-octane gas, how much is it?”) and answering travel questions with natural-sounding speech; it represents China’s first digital service agent in the petroleum retail sector. The Nanning station trial was explicitly highlighted as part of this rollout, aligning with Guangxi’s push for “AI+” in traditional industries.
In February 2025 Nanning’s healthcare sector deployed its first AI-powered virtual doctor. Nanning First People’s Hospital (南宁市第一人民医院) introduced a “digital doctor” avatar modeled on its chief cardiologist, Professor Liu Jie. Available 24/7 via voice or text interface, this avatar can analyze a patient’s records and symptoms to provide personalized advice, handle pre-visit guidance and post-visit follow-up, thus extending expert consultation beyond normal hours. The hospital reported that the avatar’s constant availability and natural dialog earned widespread patient approval.
In April 2025 a private AI company in Nanning demonstrated a novel system for creating digital avatars of deceased loved ones to comfort mourners. This service uses advanced AI to synthesize a late person’s face, voice and mannerisms from video and image data, aiming to let families “speak” with a virtual persona of the deceased. The launch garnered considerable public attention, reflecting ethical debates, but exemplified the cutting-edge experimentation with virtual human technology in Guangxi at that time.
Guangxi Tianneng Artificial Intelligence Application Technology Service Co., Ltd. (广西天能人工智能应用技术服务有限公司) is a Nanning-based AI services firm that became publicly associated with “digital human” work in early 2024 through a consumer-facing “reappear a loved one” offering that uses personal media and biographical materials to construct an interactive virtual persona of a deceased person. Reporting on demonstrations in the run-up to Qingming described its production pipeline as combining a cloned voice model, a cloned visual likeness and facial-expression model, and a structured “memory” description component so the resulting digital human can either deliver scripted content as video or engage in real-time conversational interaction. The same coverage described a typical turnaround of about a week and a tiered price range in the hundreds to several thousand RMB, and it placed the company’s work at the center of public discussion about consent, privacy, misuse, and psychological effects that accompany high-fidelity digital human reconstruction.
In July 2025 Guangxi hosted the “AI for All: China‑ASEAN” (AI赋能千行百业超级联赛) innovation competition in Nanning, inviting participants across China and ASEAN with no entry barriers. The kickoff ceremony on 19 July 2025 emphasized inclusive participation (“open to all with no barriers to entry” ) and featured myriad AI demonstrations, although not specific to any one city. By positioning this annual contest in Guangxi, the region sought to highlight its role as an AI hub for the China‑ASEAN community.
In September 2025 Guangxi scholars unveiled two major AI-human projects. On 16 September at the China‑ASEAN AI Cooperation Conference in Nanning a specially programmed virtual presenter named “Dr. Zhiyan” hosted alongside a humanoid robot, energizing the opening ceremony. Developed by Guangxi’s own AI research institute, Dr. Zhiyan uses large language models and deep learning to achieve highly realistic speech interaction and context-aware responses. The conference showcased this “digital human + robot” hosting model as a highlight of Guangxi’s technology prowess in AI. One day later at the 22nd China‑ASEAN Expo, the First Affiliated Hospital of Guangxi Medical University introduced “Miyu Yitan,” the world’s first urology-specialist AI doctor supporting minor ASEAN languages. Miyu Yitan can answer questions in Chinese, English and Vietnamese (and will expand to Thai, Burmese, Khmer, etc.), bridging communication gaps for ASEAN patients. This multilingual medical avatar, built on a specialized big‑model architecture, demonstrated Guangxi’s leadership in applying virtual human AI to healthcare.
"AI for All: China-ASEAN" (AI赋能千行百业超级联赛) is a Guangxi-centered, China–ASEAN-facing AI competition and showcase program that culminated in a high-profile closing-night event branded “A超之夜” ("AI Super League") Guangxi University in Nanning on December 26, 2025, positioning itself around the theme “AI Guangxi, AI China, AI ASEAN” and combining awards, project exhibitions, and roadshow-style demonstrations. In the context of digital humans, its stage programming explicitly treated digital humans as a flagship application category, using “AI release” segments that included digital-human showcases and leveraging a media-style digital human presenter (reported as People’s Daily Online’s digital human “Bai Ze”) to announce key awards, thereby framing digital humans as both a deployable product form for industry scenarios and a public-facing interface for communicating AI achievements to a broad audience.
[Feb 2026]
2025
July 19, 2025: “AI for All: China-ASEAN” competition launched in Nanning, Guangxi to explore AI applications with no entry barriers for enterprises and developers.
April 1, 2025: An AI technology company based in Nanning demonstrated digital resurrection processes for creating AI avatars of deceased people for mourning purposes.
February 19, 2025: Nanning First People’s Hospital launched its first AI-powered digital doctor modeled after cardiology chief Liu Jie, providing 24/7 consultation services.
January 18, 2025: Sinopec launched China’s first AI fueling assistant digital employee on trial at over 40 stations nationwide, including Xinyang Station in Nanning, Guangxi.
2024
October 25, 2024: Xiangzhou County Federation of Trade Unions in Guangxi introduced digital human “Xiaohui” at the Xiangzhou Digital Health Future Industry Conference, featuring realistic appearance and advanced AI capabilities.
October 17, 2024: Baise City launched its first “digital government human” with intelligent interactive capabilities at the Baise Government Service Center to provide smart government services.
November 25, 2024: Research from Guangxi University in Nanning published a study on how anthropomorphic virtual influencer images impact consumer purchase behavior, finding a U-shaped relationship between realism levels and purchase intention.
May 11, 2024: Sanjiang Dong Autonomous County in Guangxi introduced the first Dong ethnic digital human at a cultural tourism promotion event in Beijing, featuring traditional attire and interactive cultural representation.
2023
November 25, 2023: Guangxi Huzhen Technology Co., Ltd. was identified as a Chinese company focusing on virtual human technology and AI-driven chat applications for the Metaverse, showcasing ultra-realistic virtual humans in their MoBao app.