This case presents the ascent of SenseTime, a Chinese company powered by facial recognition technology and became the world's most valuable artificial intelligence (AI) startup. Based in Shenzhen, SenseTime aspired to lead AI innovation to power the future. It offered a variety of business solutions across industries that went beyond facial recognition. Enabled by its high-performance deep learning supercomputing system, it deployed and developed solutions quickly to more than 400 partners and clients. Moving forward, SenseTime planned to expand to more vertical industries and go abroad. How could this young company deepen its technological edge, broaden its industry applications, and sustain fast growth for the long term?

Beeplus, a designer and operator of co-working spaces, was founded in 2015 by a group of enterprising college students led by Robert Jia. It currently has five co-working space projects in Zhuhai, Shenzhen and Guangzhou. This case maps the journey taken by Beeplus and its management team in its foray into the highly competitive co-working space industry, and offers a greater understanding of the critical success factors for a company operating in an aggressive market in China.

Our case focuses on Da Jiang Innovations (DJI), the Shenzhen-based company that contributed significantly to the growing popularity of civilian drones not only in China, but also globally. It chronicles the genesis and development of the company and its recent efforts to address current challenges and anticipating future competition. DJI within a few years of producing its first drone, cornered more than 70% of the global civilian drone market and emerged as a "decacorn", which are "unicorns" that valued at least US$10 billion. However, with intensifying competition and rapid shifts in technology, DJI's leadership position could erode quickly. Additionally, as concerns about safety, privacy, and security continued to mount, what should DJI do? Our case offers students an opportunity to analyse the challenges and opportunities that confront a new market leader in an emerging industry, in the face of mounting competition and rapid technological shifts from 2017. It also showcases the rise of globally-minded Chinese firms, with DJI as an exemplar. These "born global" firms, also known as micro-multinationals, went global from the start and did not try to build a base in China's domestic markets as their first steps.