In accordance with the strategic requirements of constructing Shanghai into a learning city and the development of education informatization, Shanghai Open University has enhanced its innovation ability and comprehensive strength in terms of scientific research, with applied basic research as its emphasis and the integration of industry, learning and research as its feature.

In recent years, Shanghai Open University has been strengthening technological innovations and the ability of serving the society on platforms such as Shanghai Municipal Postdoctoral Innovation and Practice Base, the Research Center of Engineering Technology for Shanghai Open and Distance Education, and the Laboratory of Information Security and Innovation of Social Management, and enhancing the scientific research strength with its own characteristics through the establishment of International Research Academy of Open Education, The Laboratory for the Digitalization of Open Instruction, and the Institute of Traditional Chinese Culture. The University has undertaken a series of state-level or provincial-level scientific research projects, such as Linux-based Resource Management and Application Platform Software on Multimedia Online Instruction, an 863 Program project funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, A Study of the Internet Politics and Social Management in Web 2.0 Times and The Place of Open University in Building Shanghai into a Learning City and its Development, both projects being supported by the National Social Science Found. And the University’s funds for scientific research are consecutively on the rise. Many influential achievements of scientific research have been obtained in the areas of the construction of a learning society, open and distance education, and the application of educational technologies. The research project Turning the Digital Gap into a Digital Opportunity: The Project for Building the Digital Lifelong Learning System in Shanghai was awarded the UNESCO King Hamad Bin Isa Al Khalifa Prize. And some other projects have also won either Shanghai Science and Technology Progress Award or Shanghai Outstanding Achievement Award of Philosophy and Social Sciences.