Liam Bates () is an entrepreneur, television host and adventurer from

Switzerland ). Swiss law does not designate a ''capital'' as such, but the federal parliament and government are installed in Bern, while other federal institutions, such as the federal courts, are in other cities (Bellinzona, Lausanne, Luzern, Neuchâtel ...

, born 28 June 1988. Bates' first appearance on Chinese television was during the 2010 Chinese Bridge language contest, in which he received first prize and the eloquence prize. The show aired in front of a TV audience of almost 300 million. Bates has gone on to present TV shows for the

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Chan ...

and has founded several companies in China. In 2017, Bates made the Forbes 30 under 30 list.

Early life

Liam Bates was born in the canton of Vaud outside Geneva, Switzerland to an American mother and a British-Zimbabwean father. At school he spoke French. He later went on to study Chinese and film at the

University of British Columbia The University of British Columbia (UBC) is a public research university with campuses near Vancouver and in Kelowna, British Columbia. Established in 1908, it is British Columbia's oldest university. The university ranks among the top thr ...

in Canada.

Television career

Following Bates' Chinese Bridge success in September 2010 he joined The Travel Channel China as their newest host, where he began a regular travel series filmed throughout the Chinese countryside. His first shows focused on rural life in

Hunan Hunan (, ; ) is a landlocked province of the People's Republic of China, part of the South Central China region. Located in the middle reaches of the Yangtze watershed, it borders the province-level divisions of Hubei to the north, Jiangx ...

Guizhou Guizhou (; Postal romanization, formerly Kweichow) is a landlocked Provinces of China, province in the Southwest China, southwest region of the China, People's Republic of China. Its capital and largest city is Guiyang, in the center of the pr ...

and other Chinese provinces. Each show had Bates spending a week living with farmers and learning about their local cultures. In 2011 Bates and 'The Travel Channel China' team spent two weeks in his home country of

, filming several aspects of Swiss life: chocolate-making, Alpine cowherding and cheese production,

Swiss military The Swiss Armed Forces (german: Schweizer Armee, french: Armée suisse, it, Esercito svizzero, rm, Armada svizra; ) operates on land and in the air, serving as the primary armed forces of Switzerland. Under the country's militia system, re ...

. The resulting television show broke numerous records in China, with the first 30-minute episode registering 1.5 million views on video-sharing website Youku alone. Bates became more widely known in China than in his home country. In early 2012 Bates began a new series, ''A Love for Adventure'' (我爱大冒险) and the ''Last Tribe'' (最后的部落). In this show, he travelled around the world seeking out small tribes who have maintained their traditional lifestyles in order to learn their survival techniques. In 2016 Bates completed filming of a new series for the

, "Expedition X: Silk Road Rising".

Entrepreneur

Bates started his first company in 2006 at 17 years old, Beijing-based Bridges to China. In 2014 Bates co-founded Kaiterra (formerly Origins Technology), a startup that develops IoT hardware and software products to measure global air quality and pollution levels. In April 2016, Kaiterra's consumer air quality monitor, the Laser Egg, entered the Apple Stores across China. In 2017, Bates and Kaiterra co-founder Jessica Lam were selected for the Forbes 30 under 30 list.

Hangzhou Ambassador

In May 2013 Bates was officially appointed tourism ambassador to the Chinese city of

Hangzhou Hangzhou ( or , ; , , Standard Chinese, Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), also Chinese postal romanization, romanized as Hangchow, is the capital and most populous city of Zhejiang, China. It is located in the northwestern part of the prov ...

. Bates was awarded a $55,000/year contract to regularly visit and explore

, sharing his experiences on social media under the title of the 'Modern Marco Polo'. This made him the first foreigner ever to be appointed by China's government in such an official role.

Xiangsheng

Bates was formally invited to begin the study of '' xiangsheng'' (a traditional form of "crosstalk" comedy) by famous Chinese comedian Ding Guangquan after his success in the Chinese Bridge contest. In February 2012, in a traditional ceremony at the Confucius Institute, University of Hawaii, he was formally accepted into the xiangsheng hierarchy when he took Ding Guangquan to be his Shifu. Today '' xiangsheng'' is still a large part of Bates' work, and he performs regularly on

China Central Television China Central Television (CCTV) is a Chinese state- and political party-owned broadcaster controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Its 50 different channels broadcast a variety of programing to more than one billion viewers in six lan ...

Other work

Bates became known publicly through Chinese Bridge and his travel shows, but he gradually expanded into other activities, including hosting live events and leading outdoors/survival courses. His popularity as a performer and foreign personality on Chinese television has grown steadily: his Chinese micro-blog has grown to tens of thousands of registered followers in just two years.

References

External links

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Bates' outdoors channel
on Youku {{DEFAULTSORT:Bates, Liam 1988 births People from the canton of Vaud Swiss performance artists Chinese television presenters Swiss television personalities Living people Swiss businesspeople University of British Columbia alumni Swiss expatriates in Canada Swiss expatriates in China