Apple announced on the 26th that it has decided to donate 30 million yuan (about 60 million won) to Zhejiang University. The prestigious engineering school is known as the alma mater of Liang Wenfeng, the founder of the Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot DeepSeek, which surprised the world in January this year.
On the same day, Apple stated through its Chinese website, "We will establish the 'Apple Mobile Application Incubation Fund' jointly with Zhejiang University and decided to donate 30 million yuan to the university." It added, "Apple has donated a total of 50 million yuan (about 100 million won) to Zhejiang University over the past 10 years to run the 'Mobile Application Innovation Competition,'" explaining that "more than 30,000 participants from over 1,000 universities in the Chinese-speaking world have benefited from this competition."
Apple also noted that "it plans to continue supporting coding education in China in the future" and that "the fund of 30 million yuan will provide more business education by urging the consolidation of student developers with industry leaders and investors through seminars, internships, and mentoring systems."
Apple's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Tim Cook stated, "We are honored to deepen our 10-year partnership with Zhejiang University to provide technological support to the next generation of developers, helping them to develop innovative applications and thrive in entrepreneurship."
CEO Cook made a surprise appearance at the 10th anniversary event of the 'Mobile App Innovation Competition' held at Zhejiang University that day, meeting with students, local Chinese media including Chao Xinwen reported.
Although Cook's remarks on the site were not detailed, images of him taking commemorative photos with Chinese students and freely conversing were shared on social media platforms such as Weibo.
Meanwhile, Apple fell to third place last year after years of being the top smartphone seller in China, being surpassed by local companies such as Huawei and Vivo.