Dr Christina Yan Zhang

Why organisations work with Christina Yan Zhang

• She co-writes the UN ITU standards her clients will eventually be measured against. Her CitiVerse evaluation framework spans 130 indicators across 14 domains, with input from more than 30 global authorities.
• She has converted that standards work into operational strategy for cities, including Tampere’s Metaverse Vision 2040, the first people-centred metaverse strategy adopted as a UN resource for governments.
• Her China innovation insight is grounded in direct operating experience, not commentary. As QS China Director from 2013 to 2020, she sat across hundreds of Chinese universities, national labs and science parks during the 13th Five-Year Plan.
• She holds advisory positions across the International Science Council’s Centre for Science Futures, The Economist Impact’s AI economy board, and TechUK’s Digital Twins Board, giving her unusually direct line of sight into where AI policy is heading.
• She was named in the 100 Global Women in AI 2025 list at Davos and chaired the jury of the 2024 Metaverse Entertainment World Awards under the patronage of Prince Albert II of Monaco.

Biography highlights

• CEO, The Metaverse Institute
• Vice Chair, UN ITU Metaverse Working Group on Sustainability, Accessibility and Inclusion
• Co-Chair, UN ITU Task Group on Pre-standardisation for the CitiVerse
• Author of the UN’s first approved technical report on People-Centred CitiVerse
• China Director, QS World University Rankings, 2013 to 2020
• 100 Global Women in AI 2025 (announced at Davos)

Biography

The rules for AI in cities, public services and immersive environments are being written right now, mostly inside the UN ITU. Christina Yan Zhang is one of the people writing them. As Co-Chair of the UN ITU Task Group on Pre-standardisation for the CitiVerse, she leads the evaluation framework that 30 plus global authorities have shaped and that hundreds of cities are expected to align to before 2030.

That standards work feeds directly into operational strategy. Her team at The Metaverse Institute produced Tampere Metaverse Vision 2040, the first people-centred metaverse strategy commissioned by a city government and subsequently published by the UN as a resource for other administrations. She is also the author of the UN’s first approved technical report on People-Centred CitiVerse, which set out an 8-level entry framework for governments and operators moving into virtual environments.

She arrived at this work through an unusual route. Her PhD in 2012 was on digital twin applications for the construction industry, well before the term entered mainstream board conversations. Between 2013 and 2020 she was China Director for QS World University Rankings, building the firm’s China operation from scratch and sitting close to the universities, science parks and national labs that drove the country’s 13th Five-Year Plan in research and innovation.

She now advises across the International Science Council’s Centre for Science Futures, The Economist Impact’s AI economy board, and TechUK’s Digital Twins Board. The throughline is consistent: where AI, digital twins and virtual environments meet public infrastructure, she has been writing the standards before most boards have read them.

Key speaking topics

• AI governance and the UN CitiVerse standards
• Digital twins for cities and critical infrastructure
• Responsible deployment of virtual environments
• People-centred AI strategy for governments and operators
• China’s innovation system and research capacity
• Future of work in AI-enabled cities

Ideal for

• Boards and C-suites setting AI, digital and immersive technology strategy
• Government and city leadership teams designing smart city or CitiVerse roadmaps
• Heads of innovation, digital and infrastructure inside regulated industries
• Investors and operators positioning capital around AI-powered urban and built-environment plays

Audience outcomes

• A working map of where UN ITU standards on AI and the CitiVerse are heading, and what that means for their own roadmap
• A clearer view of how digital twins move from technical pilot to citywide operating system
• Direct insight into China’s innovation engine from someone who operated inside it for seven years
• A framework for testing whether their current AI and virtual-environment plans will hold up against emerging international standards