Recently, Xu Ningsheng, President of Sun Yat-sen University (SYSU) and academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences, met with Professor Cohon, President of well-known US Carnegie Mellon University (CMU). The two presidents signed an agreement in Guangzhou, Guangdong province, on establishing “Sun Yat-sen University — Carnegie Mellon University Joint Institute of Engineering” and “School of Electronics and Computer Engineering”, with the latter affiliated to the former. Through innovating in engineering education and cultivating talents, the two parties aimed at developing the institute into a leading one both in China and throughout the world so as to guide the reform of engineering education in China.

Once completed, the institute will provide top engineering education covering degrees from undergraduate to PhD, conduct cutting-edge R&D programs, and address practical problems in engineering technologies. It will also help to promote technological upgrading of industries based in China, and to transform China's economic development mode from one based on labor-intensive industry and mass production to one driven by technologies and innovation. Recently, SYSU and CMU cooperated closely by exchanging more visits. They joined hands in recruiting elite teaching staff throughout the world while preparing for the construction of Shunde Joint International Research Institute and related laboratories. SYSU has sent backbone teachers and school deans to the US for cooperative research in teaching and sciences with American counterparts.

SYSU has always been committed to a global strategy. In 2010, it cooperated with five French higher-education institutes, including Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble (INPG) in establishing Sino-French Institute of Nuclear Energy and Technology with the propulsion of Chinese and French governments. Huang Daren, the former president of SYSU, has always committed to the cooperation between SYSU and CMU.