Huawei and 1,200 Companies to Showcase Cutting-Edge Technology at AWE 2026 with Innovative Dual-Zone Exhibition Layout in Shanghai

First “One Exhibition, Dual Zones”! Over 1,200 Companies, Including Huawei, Set to Exhibit at AWE 2026, Showcasing Cutting-Edge Technology Without Time Zone Delays

On February 25, the Shanghai Municipal Government held a press conference to announce details about the upcoming China Household Appliances and Consumer Electronics Expo (AWE), which will feature a newly established exhibition area in the Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone.

This year’s AWE, themed “AI Technology, Enjoying the Future,” will take place from March 12 to 15 in Shanghai, covering a total exhibition area of 170,000 square meters and gathering 1,200 exhibitors, including leading appliance and consumer electronics companies such as Haier, Huawei, Zhiyuan, and Xreal. The event will encompass the entire industry chain, featuring segments like smart terminal chips, sensors, and AI large models, and will debut the exhibition area in the Shanghai Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone.

According to Pan Yan, Deputy Director of the Shanghai Municipal Economic and Information Commission, “Currently, a new wave of technological revolution and industrial upgrade led by artificial intelligence is rapidly evolving, bringing a paradigm shift to the global consumer electronics field. Shanghai is a hub for modern industrialization in China and a new highland for advanced manufacturing, with leading capabilities in integrated circuits and artificial intelligence, facilitating the transition of terminals from ‘electronic products’ to ‘intelligent entities,’ allowing AI to embody its ‘interesting soul.’

This year’s AWE will introduce a novel “One Exhibition, Dual Zones” layout, enabling overseas visitors to “arrive and exhibit.” A key highlight of the event is the innovative setup, featuring two main exhibition areas: the New International Expo Center and the Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone. Pan Yan explained that the New International Expo Center will cover 140,000 square meters, focusing on new smart living scenarios, while the Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone will span 30,000 square meters, showcasing groundbreaking technological achievements. With its advantage of being just 15 minutes from Pudong Airport, products can easily enter the zone and return after the exhibition, allowing overseas attendees to engage with the exhibits immediately upon arrival.

Xu Dongsheng, Vice President of the China Household Electrical Appliances Association, summarized the characteristics of the two exhibition areas: “The New International Exhibition Zone focuses on ‘AI + Ecology,’ presenting a panoramic view of intelligent living scenarios, showcasing a perfect ‘Smart +’ experience. In contrast, the Oriental Hub represents cutting-edge hard technology, concentrating on breakthroughs in consumer electronics and new productive forces. Each area has its unique features, collectively demonstrating the latest achievements of China’s technological innovation.”

The New International Expo Center will gather over 1,200 well-known domestic and international brands, showcasing a wide range of consumer electronics and smart living scenarios, including smart home appliances, whole-home intelligence, health living, and digital entertainment. The Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone will serve as a professional exhibition area for consumer electronics and cutting-edge technology, focusing on hard tech fields such as AI chips, computing power, 6G, embodied intelligence, and new energy.

It was reported that the Shanghai Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone is the “world’s first and the only” zero-time-difference business zone, with its pilot area already under closed management. It will be developed based on the management systems of a comprehensive bonded area, customs supervision area, and port restricted area, augmented by specific policies facilitating cross-border movement of personnel and business services, creating a benchmark region with the highest level of international openness and the best business environment.

Zhao Yugang, Deputy Director of the Oriental Hub International Business Cooperation Zone Management Bureau, stated, “We are planning and constructing incubators for scientific research and development, training and exhibition centers for medical devices, and innovation hubs within the business cooperation zone, supporting key industry developments in biomedicine, integrated circuits, and artificial intelligence. With policies enabling convenient international personnel entry and import duty exemptions for equipment, companies can efficiently collaborate across borders, engaging in technical exchanges, joint innovations, and result transformations.”

Pan Yan also noted that the exhibition will feature the first AI-native smartphone, robots, and companion terminals, showcasing how the rapid development of large models allows AI to transition from screens to physical entities, gaining bodies, eyes, and limbs. Domestic intelligent computing chips are supporting a surge in demand for smart terminals. Since last year, Shanghai has seen a number of representative products emerge in the market, which will also be showcased at this AWE, such as the first AI-native smartphone developed by ZTE Nubia in collaboration with ByteDance, breaking traditional smartphone operating paradigms. Additionally, the AI toy Furai utilizes large model capabilities to achieve long-term memory, emotional perception, and human-like feedback, becoming a great companion.

The exhibition will feature leading appliance and consumer electronics companies such as Haier, Huawei, Zhiyuan, and Xreal, covering the entire industry chain from smart terminal chips to sensors and AI large models. Among the exhibits will be humanoid robots capable of performing tasks, emotional-aware companion terminals that can converse, and AI smart glasses that bridge virtual and real worlds.

The AWE 2026 will also host over ten forums and supporting activities in the New International Exhibition Zone, continuing a series of consumer promotion activities, including the AWE Refresh Consumer Festival, AWE Live Night, AWE Coffee Lifestyle Festival, and AWE Kitchen Appliance Food Festival, with AWE Live Night expanding to two evenings this year. The Oriental Hub zone will host more than 20 forums and supporting activities, including the Young Leaders Entrepreneurs Forum, Power Launch Roundtable, and seminars on the silver economy and AI healthcare, covering key areas such as smart glasses and VR products, smart terminals and semiconductors, ultra-high-definition audio-visual industry, electronic circuits, automotive chips, industry chain collaboration, and international trade financing.

Notably, in the new exhibition zone, the organizers will arrange multiple trade matching events where JD.com and Tmall store owners, along with top offline channel representatives, will form a touring group deeply engaging with the exhibition. International dealers, manufacturers, and multinational buyers from abroad will have face-to-face discussions with local Chinese brands and manufacturers regarding product introductions, channel expansions, and brand partnerships.

In the context of global competition, Shanghai is accelerating the cultivation of self-owned brands in the smart terminal sector and enhancing its global industrial influence. Pan Yan highlighted three characteristics of Shanghai’s smart terminal industry: a solid industrial foundation with comprehensive layouts, a concentration of innovative resources providing strong technological momentum, and a rich variety of application scenarios with national-leading conversion efficiencies. Currently, Shanghai is focusing on ten key areas, including AI PCs, AI smartphones, robotics, and smart glasses, consolidating leading companies and innovative entities to build a collaborative ecosystem covering the entire chain from critical chips, high-end sensors, and novel displays to complete machine design.

According to Pan Yan, from core components to complete machine manufacturing, and to multi-faceted application services, Shanghai has created a comprehensive industrial ecosystem. In the integrated circuit sector, over 1,200 integrated circuit companies are based in Shanghai. In the field of artificial intelligence, industrial clusters like Xuhui “Mosu Space” and Pudong “Moli Community” gather nearly 1,000 AI enterprises. In new display technologies, Micro-LED has achieved the smallest dimensions and highest brightness globally, and light guide manufacturing processes are leading the world. In terms of complete machines, Shanghai has prominent ODM companies, with over 300 million smartphones designed last year; industrial robots account for one-sixth of national output value and one-eighth of total production; and smart glasses lead domestic shipments.

As globalization accelerates, the development of artificial intelligence is advancing the smart terminal and home appliance industries. Pan Yan stated that Shanghai will continue to push forward the smart terminal industry while fully embracing artificial intelligence, leveraging AI’s momentum to create more household-name terminal products. The focus will be on deep collaboration among upstream and downstream companies in terminals, chips, operating systems, software applications, and content services, establishing an integrated ecological system of “hardware + software + services” for all scenarios. Through various policy support packages, Shanghai aims to accelerate the development of AI terminal companies.

Shanghai’s unique advantage lies in the deep integration of three driving forces: “scientific innovation, industry, and market.” By fully utilizing the long-term layout of hardware and software, Shanghai aims to enhance soft and hard collaborative capabilities, facilitating the rapid transformation of cutting-edge technologies into terminal products, and achieving efficient localized cooperation and production capacity in the Yangtze River Delta. As an international consumer center and trade hub, Shanghai not only serves the local market but also helps enterprises expand globally.