Digital solutions powering up traditional sectors

Staff members discuss how to better present their displays at the Tongxiang exhibition booth during the ongoing WIC. WEI XIAOHAO/CHINA DAILY

A large number of traditional manufacturing enterprises in Tongxiang, Zhejiang province, have completed technical transformation and upgrading in recent years, and they are beginning to reap the benefits of these changes.

Tongxiang is a county-level city where Wuzhen, the venue of the World Internet Conference, is located.

Tongxiang's traditional industries include silk, chemical fibers, and glass fibers, which have supported Tongxiang's economic and social development for years. While the fast-paced development of the digital economy has given birth to intelligent vehicles, intelligent computing, intelligent sensing, and industrial internet, it has also succeeded in promoting the transformation and reform of local traditional industries.

Puyuan town, located in Tongxiang and near the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, is now renowned as a digital and intelligent sweater town. The internet has driven the local market from offline to online, and digital reform has promoted the transformation of the market, and production.

Specifically for its production, the extensive use of intelligent technologies has changed the traditional model of the sweater industry.

For its industry, the smart internet platform for sweaters has been launched, which can provide the exact date of the trading index, price index, and fashion index.

For its market, a new application of smart logistics has been launched to realize the closed loop of the production chain, sales chain, circulation chain and supporting facilities.

Tongxiang has also built a big data high-tech zone in Wuzhen, two high-energy ecological parks, three major science and technology cities, and 10 parks in the cities. It plans to invest 15.5 billion yuan ($2.14 billion) to promote the construction of 28 science and technology parks in the city, of which 2.6 billion yuan is expected to be used for building strategic technology innovation platforms, such as Wuzhen Laboratory and Tsinghua Yangtze River Delta Tongxiang Innovation Center.

The number of digital economy enterprises in Tongxiang has increased from more than 350 in 2014 to more than 2,800 now. The output value of the core manufacturing industry of the digital economy has more than quadrupled from less than 5 billion yuan in 2014 to 22.2 billion yuan last year.