PeopleofSuperintelligence

Researcher

Shaoqing Ren

Also known as 任少卿, Ren Shaoqing

Shaoqing Ren is a computer-vision researcher whose residual learning helped make deep image networks easier to train. His Faster R-CNN work made region proposals nearly cost-free. He earned a bachelor’s degree at USTC and a joint PhD with Microsoft Research Asia, co-founded autonomous-driving startup Momenta, and joined NIO to lead driving work. His residual-learning work received the 2023 Future Science Prize; Faster R-CNN and Deep Residual Learning later received test-of-time awards. As of October 2026, he is an endowed chair professor in charge of USTC’s Artificial General Intelligence Institute, remains head of NIO’s Smart Driving department, and is starting a physical-AI and embodied-intelligence business with NIO as a strategic shareholder.

Works
19
Citations
334,634
h-index
13

Publication numbers from OpenAlex, as of 14 October 2026.

Photo of Shaoqing Ren

Timeline

  1. 2011–2016

    A joint doctorate

    He earned a bachelor’s degree at the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) in 2011 and completed a PhD through a joint USTC and Microsoft Research Asia program in 2016.

  2. 2015

    Learning to propose regions

    With Kaiming He, Ross Girshick, and Jian Sun, he coauthored Faster R-CNN. The paper introduced a Region Proposal Network that shares convolutional features with the detection network to generate nearly cost-free object proposals.

  3. 2016

    Training deeper networks

    With Kaiming He, Xiangyu Zhang, and Jian Sun, he coauthored Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition. Its residual framework made substantially deeper networks easier to train by learning functions relative to each layer’s input.

  4. 2016–2020

    Building an autonomous-driving startup

    He co-founded Momenta, an autonomous-driving software startup, and worked there from 2016 to 2020. It aimed to use AI to improve driving safety and efficiency.

  5. Since 2020

    Taking perception onto the road

    He joined NIO in 2020 to lead autonomous-driving work. He announced 10,000 NOP+ experience slots, with sessions available at nearly 400 stores.

  6. 2023–2026

    Recognition across a decade

    He received the 2023 Future Science Prize in Mathematics and Computer Science for fundamental contributions to AI through deep residual learning. Faster R-CNN received NeurIPS’s 2025 Test of Time Award, and Deep Residual Learning received the 2026 Longuet-Higgins Prize. A September 2026 preprint, MM-Future, models multiple scene-action possibilities for autonomous driving.

  7. As of October 2026

    Leading in physical AI

    He is an endowed chair professor in charge of USTC’s Artificial General Intelligence Institute. He is starting a physical-AI and embodied-intelligence business, with NIO as a strategic shareholder, while remaining head of NIO’s Smart Driving department.

Sources and credits

Photo: faculty.ustc.edu.cn; 中国科学技术大学 Shaoqing Ren--Home-- Computer Vision; creator not stated. License: Not stated by source. Source: faculty.ustc.edu.cn. Cropped to a square and resized. Ask us to remove or replace this photo.

  1. 2023 The Mathematics and Computer Science Prize Laureates — Shaoqing Ren futureprize.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  2. Faster R-CNN: Towards Real-Time Object Detection with Region Proposal Networks arxiv.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  3. Deep Residual Learning for Image Recognition openaccess.thecvf.com. Checked 14 October 2026.
  4. Shaoqing Ren shaoqingren.com. Checked 14 October 2026.
  5. What's New with NIO in March? nio.com. Checked 14 October 2026.
  6. Announcing the Test of Time Paper Award for NeurIPS 2025 blog.neurips.cc. Checked 14 October 2026.
  7. Pattern Analysis and Machine Intelligence Awards computer.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  8. MM-Future: Multi-Mode Joint World-Action Modeling for Autonomous Driving arxiv.org. Checked 14 October 2026.
  9. NIO (NIO) Q2 2026 Earnings Call Transcript fool.com. Checked 14 October 2026.