“We must be the first 10 billion quantification in Jiangsu”

The leading domestic quantitative fund illusion “bred” DeepSeek, which has attracted the outside world to pay attention to the development of the quantitative fund industry and the positive contribution of the industry to the development of artificial intelligence in specific practical scenarios. Let us go to Beiyang Quantitative located in Nanjing Economic and Technological Development Zone to understand the development of quantitative funds.

The “genius boys” hiding in office buildings

The ordinary front desk layout, the crackling keyboard sounds in the grid, and half-drinking coffee on the table in the lounge… This is the daily life of Jiangsu Head Quantitative Fund.

Like many entrepreneurial enterprises, since their official establishment in 2020, Beiyang Quantitative has developed “silently” in an office building in Nanjing Economic and Technological Development Zone. Before the DeepSeek boom, almost no one except domestic quantitative investment peers had paid attention to this small company.

Quantitative investment refers to the use of advanced technical means and big data analysis capabilities, and the use of mathematical models and computer programs to conduct in-depth analysis and prediction of large amounts of market data to find investment opportunities that can bring excess returns.

Unlike traditional quantitative institutions, Feng Ji, the founder of Beiyang Quantitative, does not like to call his company a financial trading institution. He prefers to define the company as “a quantitative research institute established by pure AI scientists.”

Here, the talent density is particularly high. “The entire company has less than 50 employees, more than 20 of whom are technical personnel, born in the 1995-00s, all from mathematics and computer departments of top universities at home and abroad. Their resumes are talented young people who can benchmark against the R&D departments of large factories.” Feng Ji said.

Walking in the office area of ​​Beiyang Quantitative, you can clearly feel the feeling of order that is unique to a team in science and engineering background. Feng Ji even said proudly: “Although quantitative funds do secondary market transactions, the company does not have a professional financial employee.”

The essence of quantitative transactions is data and modeling. Feng Ji studied at Shandong University’s Taishan School (Everest Talent Training Program), and later studied at the School of Computer Science and Technology of Nanjing University, where he studied under Professor Zhou Zhihua. In 2018, he was still in his second year of PhD and was hired to join Innovation Works as the executive director of Innovation Works Nanjing AI Research Institute, exploring the implementation scenarios of artificial intelligence. In this process, Feng Ji discovered that quantitative funds are the most natural application scenario for AI, because quantitative investment requires analyzing a large amount of high-quality data and making decisions, and these are what AI is best at doing.

“The goal of working with geniuses is very clear, which is to engage in technology. In Nanjing, our talent density even exceeds that of many well-known technology companies.” Feng Ji said.

“Cibulous computing power” is inseparable from continuous R&D investment

The “genius boys” gather together to stay up late for the upgrade of a system and cheer for the success of a calculation.

Supported by their “strongest brain”, Beiyang Quantization needs to process 25T of financial data every day. The huge computing power demand has resulted in the office area consuming more than 200 degrees of electricity per hour, and the system must be upgraded every two weeks. Each of the small squares in the computer room is very expensive. Feng Ji said that although it is expensive, you must continue to invest, which is a risk and what everyone wants.

In 2022, Beiyang launched its first asset management product, raising 500 million yuan that month; since 2023, Beiyang’s management scale has steadily increased, and the current asset management scale has reached nearly 5 billion yuan.

Because quantitative investment has achieved good cash flow, Beiyang Quantitative has also begun to continue to invest in R&D regardless of gains and losses, and to build stronger computing power. As of now, the company has two computing power centers, target computing power 158PFLOPS.

“The office area on this floor is about 1,500 square meters. It is planned to take down the first floor of the office space upstairs, continue to recruit high-end talents in the fields of mathematics and computers, and strive to do their best to expand computing power and achieve better results.” Feng Ji said that he hopes that the company can use higher standards for international technology companies to demand itself in the process of continuous development and growth.

“We must be the first 10 billion quantification in Jiangsu”

Public information shows that quantitative funds originated in the United States in the 1970s. At that time, the proposal of asset pricing models and the advancement of computer technology laid the foundation for quantitative investment, and a group of pioneers used mathematical models and computer programs to guide investment decisions.

In fact, the emergence and development of quantitative funds have always been gradually flourishing with the development of computer technology. It is worth mentioning that as far as the domestic market is concerned, after the passive index fund surpassed the active equity fund in terms of scale and performance last year, it basically announced the official arrival of the “index investment era” based on AI.

“From the development of foreign quantitative funds, for the secondary market itself, quantitative funds have effectively improved market effectiveness and liquidity; for the entire society, the technology produced by quantitative funds can truly feed back to the technical community and achieve a combination of theory and practice. This situation has typical cases in the history of human science and technology, called technology spillover. For example, the civil use of technology in the Apollo plan, microwave ovens were born, etc.,” said Feng Ji.

As one of the most efficient scenarios for artificial intelligence applications, the quantitative fund industry has indeed shown many advantages, such as providing high salaries to gather first-class talents, and refining relevant technologies more in a timely manner to apply them to other fields.

Feng Ji hopes that the company can “become Jiangsu’s first 10 billion quantitative product.” The scale of 10 billion means that Beiyang Quantitative has more strength to make new explorations in artificial intelligence. He also admitted that the development of quantitative investment requires policy and social inclusion, and requires top talents at home and abroad. For the former, referring to the development of foreign quantitative funds, this industry can grow many internationally renowned investment institutions and investors; for the latter, we hope that more top professional talents will be encouraged to understand Jiangsu and take root in Jiangsu through the small window of quantitative funds.

“The development of AI will definitely bring more possibilities. But only on the basis of continuously accumulating computing power and talents can innovation and breakthrough results be achieved. Our original intention of science and technology to be good remains unchanged, and Beiyang Quantitative is also planning to extract common technologies developed in its own work and other fields, establish a special technology company, and feed back to society.” Feng Ji said.