AI TRENDS | Qiming Venture Partners Lists 2026 AI Outlook Across Four Areas

Qiming Venture Partners released its 2026 AI outlook, outlining forecasts for the next 12 to 24 months across foundation models, embodied intelligence, AI infrastructure and AI applications. According to Odaily, the report said AI computing demand is shifting from training to inference, while storage, advanced process nodes and advanced packaging will continue to face structural shortages. The firm said computing resource reserves will become an important strategic resource for AI companies over the next two years. It also said competition in AI infrastructure will expand from chip rivalry to system-level competition covering chips, interconnects, cooling and power supply. Qiming Venture Partners forecast that AI application commercialization will focus more on vertical industries and high-paying users in the next 12 to 24 months. It said efficiency-improving enterprise applications will emerge first, and that consumer AI applications with broad popularity may gradually appear as token costs fall and interaction methods change. The firm also said AI-native organizations will move from concept to practice, and that some companies may achieve several times the per-employee productivity of traditional organizations.