The 2018 China International Sleeping Technology Expo and China Summit on Sleeping Industry was launched in Beijing on March 21, which is World Sleep Day.
The event was organized jointly by the China Sleep Research Society and the Beijing brand of China Council for the Promotion of International Trade, and participated in by dozens of domestic and international associations and enterprises in the sleep industry.
According to Han Fang, chairman of the society, the sleep industry has seen fast growth over past years, as more people in the country face sleeping problems and both people's incomes and awareness of healthy sleep have increased.
Development of new technologies, such as the internet of things and big data has contributed to that growth, he added.
The society, founded in 1994 by the China Association for Science and Technology, is a key academic organization which has organized annual activities on sleep for the past 18 years. This year, a large-scale nationwide educational campaign on sleep was launched.
According to the society, the market scale of the "sleep industry" has already surpassed 120 billion yuan ($19 billion), with strong growth momentum.
"The sleep-related industry is an emerging one covering the entire population, and a new economic growth point in China's health spending," Han said at the expo's opening ceremony.
He explained the expo is organized to help further integrate various participants, including researchers, enterprises, academic organizations and hospitals, and strengthen cooperation between them.
A series of programs, including a retrospective exhibition on the society's popular science activities over the past 17 years, release of new products by participating companies, voluntary clinic services as well as lectures related to healthy sleep, are planned to be held at the three-day expo.
