China Telecom, Rokid and ZTE Launch First Commercial 5G-A and AI-Glasses Powered Smart Tour Guide in Taizhou, Zhejiang

ZTE (0763.HK / 000063.SZ) Corporation (0763.HK / 000063.SZ), a global leading provider of integrated information and communication technology solutions, together with China Telecom Zhejiang has rolled out the 5G-A AI-glasses immersive smart tour guide service at the ancient city of Taizhou. This marks the first large-scale deployment of a 5G-A private network plus AI-glasses smart cultural tourism solution in a national 5A-level ancient city scenic area.

China Telecom Zhejiang and ZTE provide network technology support for the project, which is coordinated and operated by the Ancient City of Taizhou. Rokid supplies Rokid Glass3 as the AI interaction terminal. Covering the entire Ziyang Ancient Street, the service meets diverse visitor demands for in-depth cultural research, leisure sightseeing and check-in, and casual wandering exploration. It delivers real-time interactive features including commentary, navigation and itinerary planning. Visitors can rent the devices on demand, establishing a new paradigm for digital upgrading and user experience in smart cultural tourism for ancient cities.

The ancient city of Taizhou is a national 5A-level tourist attraction. Home to the thousand-year-old city wall known as the "Great Wall of the South of the Yangtze River", it boasts core heritage resources including Ziyang Ancient Street, which retains the street layout dating back to the Song Dynasty, receiving over 20 million visitors annually. Adhering to the principle of prioritizing cultural relic protection, the scenic spot revitalizes the ancient city under the concept of minimum intervention and refrains from large-scale civil construction renovation. Meanwhile, as cultural tourism consumption patterns keep evolving, tourist demands are diversifying toward in-depth cultural experiences and immersive sightseeing. The lightweight, non-intrusive digital upgrade preserves the original look of the ancient city while innovating tourism service offerings, enabling sustained quality improvement and efficiency gains for the scenic area.

China Telecom Zhejiang, together with multiple partners, adopted a core strategy of "innovative experience formats plus deterministic network assurance". It achieves deep integration of AI-glasses and 5G-A private network technologies to build a smart sightseeing model tailored for the ancient city environment. On the network, China Telecom Zhejiang and ZTE deployed a lightweight 5G-A private network based on the scenic area's existing base stations. By adopting the plug-and-play intelligent engine, the system enables precise identification of AI-glasses users and local data offloading. The network incorporates AI intelligent scheduling to flexibly accommodate different types of interactive requirements and adaptively adjust resource allocation, delivering deterministic service guarantees for every visitor wearing AI-glasses. The entire private network operates in an independent closed loop within the block. Whether for real-time guided companionship or in-depth itinerary customization, it can stably support millisecond low-latency interactions for massive AI-glasses users even during holiday peak passenger flows.

In terms of user experience, the project leverages Rokid AI-glasses, featuring comfortable wear and outstanding battery life to support all-day use by visitors. Integrated with customized localized multi-category AI tour agents, the glasses offer full-scenario services including on-site commentary, high-precision navigation, route planning, real-time Q&A and image recording. Visitors are freed from handheld devices for personalized immersive sightseeing.

This deployment marks a milestone in extending 5G-A service deterministic network from industrial manufacturing to consumer-facing cultural tourism use cases. It unlocks a new consumer-grade application path for 5G-A and offers a replicable "Taizhou Model" for smart upgrades of comparable heritage scenic sites. Unlike traditional smart tourism retrofits, the solution is built on network infrastructure and powered by new AI terminals. It delivers a lightweight upgrade framework tailored for cultural heritage sites, ready for fast replication and scaling. Moving ahead, the partners will further advance smart cultural tourism, refine AI agent capabilities, address needs of site operators and visitors, expand digital tourism use cases, and foster robust growth of emerging business models.