I chose to study in China over a US college. Here's how I stayed plugged into Silicon Valley.

William Chen, co-founder of Sapient Intelligence, chose to study in China over a US college. Sapient Intelligence is an AI startup based in Singapore. Chen attended Tsinghua University in Beijing, a renowned university in China. He found the university's infrastructure supportive of student entrepreneurs and was offered a scholarship.

While in China, Chen decided to keep track of the US tech scene. To do this, he went on a 20-day road trip across the United States during his winter break. He visited universities such as MIT, Columbia University, Carnegie Mellon, the University of Pennsylvania, and the University of Michigan. Chen stayed with friends at each university, attending their classes and learning about their research and clubs.

This helped him stay connected with the US tech scene while pursuing his studies in China. After graduating from Tsinghua University, Chen and his co-founder, Guan Wang, founded Sapient Intelligence in Singapore in 2024. They are developing latent-space AI models that are faster and more cost-efficient than existing AI models. Sapient Intelligence now has a team of 50 people spread across Singapore, Beijing, and Palo Alto.