Taichung Mayor Lu Shiow-Yen recently led a delegation to visit United States. An important stop of the trip was to visit the U.S. headquarters of the technology giant Microsoft. The two sides had a warm exchange of views. Kirk Arthur, general manager of the Government Solutions Division of Microsoft's Global Public Affairs Group, posted a message on social media today (6th), praising the Taichung City Government for its outstanding achievements in digital convenience services and looking forward to further cooperation with Taichung City Government in fields such as AI and cloud computing.

 Digital Affairs Bureau of Taichung City Government stated that Mayor Lu actively promotes Taichung to move towards a smart city, proposing the strategic goal of "digital power is the city's competitiveness", moving towards the implementation of the international development trend of digital and net-zero twin transition, and striving to build a livable and sustainable smart city based on digital technology.

 During Mayor Lu's visit to the US, he specially planned to visit the global headquarters of Microsoft Corporation in Raymond City, Washington State. Due to the impact of Typhoon Gaemi, Mayor Lu returned to Taiwan urgently in the early morning to direct disaster prevention work. Instead, deputy mayor, Mayor Huang Guo-Rong led representatives from the city government including Director of Digital Affairs Bureau Lin Ku-Lung, Director of Education Bureau Jiang Wei-min, Director of Information Bureau Luan Zhi-yi and Director of Secretariat Xie Jia-zhen to visit the city on the afternoon of July 23, 2020, USA Pacific Time.

 For Microsoft, Kirk Arthur, general manager of the Government Solutions Division of Microsoft's Global Public Affairs Group, and Kai Hua, chief technology officer of Microsoft Taiwan, received the Central City Government delegation and provided valuable experience and inspiration for Taichung's digital transition. Both parties communicated harmoniously during the visit.

 Today, Kirk Arthur from Microsoft posted on the social media: "It is a privilege to receive the Taichung delegation at its headquarters in Redmond. We focus on the outstanding achievements in smart cities, digital transition and the Taichung City Government's digital citizen services. We had an in-depth discussion, which makes me very excited.” Kirk Arthur commend Taichung City Government for its achievements in promoting smart cities and digital transition.

 Digital Affairs Bureau pointed out that in the future, the city government will continue to deepen cooperation with major international technology companies such as Microsoft, actively introduce emerging technologies into municipal services, and promote digital training to enhance employees' ability to use AI. So that the government can continue to improve the efficiency of all services and promote the welfare of citizens.