ANOTHER milestone was reached for Shenzhen to become an international innovation hub Tuesday when Shenzhen's seven overseas innovation centers were inaugurated, the Shenzhen Economic Daily reported.

　　The seven overseas innovation centers in San Francisco, Boston, Seattle, London, Evelyn, Tel Aviv and Toronto are the first batch of the city's overseas institutions.

　　All seven overseas innovation centers were located in places recognized around the world for their innovation resources. The centers were jointly built by high-tech companies and research institutions in Shenzhen, like the Research Institute of Tsinghua University in Shenzhen, BGI and Tian'an Cyber Park.

　　One of the overseas centers was co-founded by the Research Institute of Tsinghua University in Shenzhen and Leaguer Group Co. Ltd. in San Francisco. The center is located in the bay area, where the world's top technology talents and corporations, including Intel, Apple, Google and Tesla, are gathered.

　　The two Shenzhen-based institutions will work with local incubators in San Francisco and Silicon Valley, namely Read Write Lab and Plug and Play, to build a team to operate the innovation center.

　　Emphasizing artificial intelligence (AI), IOT and health, this particular overseas innovation center will make use of foreign technology media outlets to promote Shenzhen's innovative corporations to the world stage and at the same time, introduce more international brands back home.

　　Moreover, the overseas center is going to use a special foundation to support cross-border projects to settle in Shenzhen.

　　Another Shenzhen company is responsible for building the overseas innovation center in Tel Aviv. The company has already come to agreements with Trendlines Group and a high-tech college in Israel to jointly maintain the center and incubate projects in the areas of biomedical, security, AI, drones and robots.

　　One of the key aspects of fulfilling the city's goal of becoming an international technology and innovation hub is building 10 overseas innovation centers. A plan has been mapped out by the municipal government at the beginning of this year to achieve the goal.

　　According to the plan, Shenzhen will build overseas innovation centers in the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Belgium, Israel, Canada and other countries and areas that have innovation resources during the 13th Five-Year Plan. The innovation centers are expected to take shape by 2020.