Haian plugs into robotics revolution

Local government in Nantong aims to build major industrial base with a 100-million-yuan fund, Ding Congrong, Lu Feng and Tang Xiaofeng report.

Haian county in Nantong, East China’s Jiangsu province, last month introduced a plan to build a robotics industrial base with an annual output value of 10 billion yuan ($1.61 billion) within the next three years.

The county plan, announced on June 15, also issued an economic blueprint for the 10 districts and townships within the county and granted a 100-million-yuan fund for the development of the robotics industry.

The fund will be used to set up research institutions, introduce high-level professionals and subsidize the purchasing of equipment and rental payments for startups.

In recent years, the county has made a greater effort to develop the industry.

In January of last year, the county government and Shanghai Jiao Tong University established an intelligent equipment research institute in the Haian Economic and Technological Development Area.

The area was upgraded to a State-level economic and technological area from a provincial one in July 2012.

Over the past year, the research institute has generated more than 60 invention patents, including an arc-welding robot that is more time-efficient than previous models and is currently being used by a number of local enterprises.

The institute also invented an automatic packaging robot for dairy producers. The robot can finish packaging 24,000 cartons of milk in one hour, equal to the workload of 100 workers.

The institute said it has received orders for the robot from two domestic dairy giants.

In September last year, the Robotics and Microsystems Center of Soochow University and the Haian government established the Jiangsu Boan Robot Technology Co to produce a range of robots that can handle a number of functions, such as polishing, stacking and handling.

More than 10 logistics enterprises in Haian are using the company’s stacking and handling robots.

Many Haian enterprises in such equipment manufacturing and textiles are also improving production efficiency by introducing automatic or semi-automatic production lines.

Jiangsu Focus Group, a machinery plant-turned photovoltaic enterprise, uses robots to handle welding and compression, which has reduced the number of workers required for each production line from 50 to two.

“We have greatly cut down on labor costs and don’t have to worry about hunting for competent workers.

The costs of the robots are expected to be covered in two years and 10 robots now handle the workload of more than 500 workers,” said Cui Leilei, deputy general manager of Jiangsu Focus.

Twelve robotics enterprises are operating in the Haian Economic and Technological Development Area.

From January to May, 64 enterprises began operations in Haian, bringing the number of enterprises in the county to 863, the most among all counties in Nantong.

Contact the writers through dingcongrong@chinadaily.com.cn