At the opening ceremony of the 2024 World Robot Conference, the "Tiāngōng 1.2MAX" embodied robot, standing at 173cm and weighing 60kg, picked up the conference emblem with both hands, autonomously walked to the center of the stage, and accurately placed the emblem on the launch platform, successfully completing its debut.

The "Tiāngōng" embodied robot represents the future manufacturing industry, which is one of the six future industries comprehensively laid out by the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (also known as Beijing Yizhuang). According to relevant plans, by 2030, Beijing Yizhuang will form several future industry clusters that lead the world, build 30 pilot industrial parks for future industries, and cultivate 300 high-quality enterprises in future industries.

Recently, the "Beijing Investment Promotion Media Tour" organized by the Beijing Investment Promotion Service Center visited the Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area (hereinafter referred to as Beijing Yizhuang). First Financial Daily reporters visited representative enterprises of future industries such as embodied robots, commercial aerospace, autonomous driving, and life sciences in Yizhuang.

Future industries are accelerating their aggregation in Beijing Yizhuang. Located in the southeast of Beijing, Beijing Yizhuang is the only economic functional area in the country that integrates the policy advantages of national economic and technological development zones, national high-tech zones, Zhongguancun independent innovation demonstration zones, service industry expansion and opening demonstration zones, and free trade pilot zones. Its development quality and scale are firmly in the first echelon of national economic and technological development zones.

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Vigorously developing future industries is a strategic choice to lead technological progress, drive industrial upgrading, and cultivate new quality productive forces. The "Decision of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China on Further Comprehensively Deepening Reform and Promoting Chinese-style Modernization" proposes to "establish a mechanism for the growth of future industry investment" when mentioning "improving the system and mechanism for developing new quality productive forces according to local conditions."

The 2024 government work report proposes to actively cultivate emerging industries and future industries, and to create a batch of pilot areas for future industries. Beijing Yizhuang, focusing on the construction of the Beijing International Science and Technology Innovation Center, has comprehensively laid out six major industries such as future information, future health, future manufacturing, future energy, future materials, and future space.

In Yizhuang, unmanned delivery vehicles can be seen everywhere on the roads, and autonomous driving taxis can be hailed with a wave of a hand. The "Rocket Street" next to the AVIC Technology Plaza exudes a strong space flavor, and the annual World Robot Conference is also held in Yizhuang.

Humanoid robots are one of the important tracks mentioned in the "Implementation Opinions on Promoting the Innovative Development of Future Industries" jointly issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other seven departments. This implementation opinion proposes to break through core technologies such as bionic perception and cognition, intelligent dexterous hands, and electronic skin in the field of humanoid robots, and to focus on promoting the research and application of products in fields such as intelligent manufacturing, household services, and special environment operations.

At the 2024 World Robot Conference, the Beijing Embodied Intelligent Robot Innovation Center brought the entire series of embodied intelligent robots "Tiāngōng" to the conference, and together with industrial chain partners, showcased a number of embodied intelligent products and technologies on the spot.The "Tiāngōng" robot possesses the ability to traverse a variety of complex terrains and the capability to run, with movements that are more humanoid. Its running and walking are more natural and stable. The running speed of "Tiāngōng" has reached 6km/h. In blind conditions, "Tiāngōng" can smoothly navigate slopes and stairs, and it can also make agile adjustments to its gait in response to tripping or stepping into empty space. Moreover, "Tiāngōng" has achieved a lifelike imitation of the full range of human body movements, being able to dance, bow, and greet.

Li Chunchi, Deputy General Manager of the Beijing Embodied Intelligence Robotics Innovation Center, stated to the press that currently, "Tiāngōng" is capable of performing complex actions such as voice interaction and unordered grasping. In the future, "Tiāngōng" will continue to undergo technological iterations and functional upgrades to adapt to more complex scenarios, serving industries such as industry, manufacturing, commerce, and households, and better aiding the development of new quality productive forces.

Autonomous driving is a significant feature of Beijing's Yizhuang. In September 2020, Beijing decided to build the world's first high-level autonomous driving demonstration zone with connected cloud control in Yizhuang. In April 2021, Beijing also established the first domestic policy pilot zone for intelligent connected vehicles, covering an area of 225 square kilometers in Yizhuang and the Daxing Airport, implementing a series of innovative policies to promote industrial development.

According to the First Financial Daily reporter from the Beijing High-Level Autonomous Driving Demonstration Zone Innovation Operation Center, as of now, the demonstration zone's vehicle road test mileage has exceeded 29 million kilometers, and temporary licenses for autonomous driving road tests have been issued to 858 vehicles from 31 companies.

In the demonstration zone, citizens can experience the travel services of autonomous passenger cars by downloading relevant mobile applications, such as Pony.ai, RoboTaxi, and WeRide. Currently, the intelligent connected passenger car travel scenario has provided services for over 2 million trips, and it has also opened up the Daxing Airport shuttle test, offering new choices for citizens' travel.

High-tech industries receive more supportive policies

At present, there are nearly 100,000 operating entities in the Yizhuang New City, gathering 158 projects invested by 103 Fortune Global 500 companies, with 2,150 national high-tech enterprises and 110 specialized, refined, and innovative "little giant" companies recognized by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. It ranks at the forefront among national economic development zones, contributing nearly 30% of the city's industrial added value with only 0.35% of Beijing's land.

Li Chunchi stated that in recent years, the economic development zone has introduced a number of supportive policies for high-tech enterprises, including tax exemptions, R&D subsidies, and support for the construction of innovation platforms. By simplifying administrative approval processes, the time required for business registration, qualification certification, and other procedures has been greatly reduced, saving valuable time for enterprises to quickly invest in R&D and production.

The commercial space industry is also a key part of Yizhuang's "future industry" layout. Currently, Beijing Yizhuang has gathered more than 70 business entities primarily engaged in the space industry, with private rocket companies that account for over 75% of the national total, covering fields such as carrier rockets, satellite development, satellite applications, model support, ground equipment, and technology applications.

Galaxy Space Power is the third private rocket company in the world to enter the 500-kilometer Sun-synchronous orbit. Meng Xiánbó, the Senior Director of Strategy at Galaxy Space Power, stated that with the gradual launch of China's version of the Starlink Qianfan constellation plan, there is a huge demand for satellite launches in China's satellite internet market, which is a significant advantage for China's commercial space enterprises.On August 6th, the first batch of constellation satellites for "Qianfan Constellation" successfully launched into orbit with "one rocket carrying 18 satellites." According to the plan, by 2024, 108 satellites will be launched, with the first phase involving the launch of 1,296 satellites, and in the future, a network of over 14,000 low-orbit broadband multimedia satellites will be established.

Meng Xiangbo stated that Beijing Yizhuang has provided a comprehensive set of policy support for the development of commercial aerospace, covering almost the entire process of a rocket launch, which has significantly reduced the company's operating costs. In terms of the business environment, the industrial team system of the Economic Development Zone has also provided many conveniences for the development of enterprises.

Earlier this year, Yizhuang issued the "Beijing Economic-Technological Development Area Measures on Building a Globally Influential Commercial Aerospace Industry High Ground," formulating 18 measures to support the commercial aerospace industry from four major aspects: strengthening independent innovation capabilities, building innovative industrial clusters, reinforcing development element guarantees, and nurturing high-quality industrial ecosystems. Industry insiders estimate that the number of commercial rocket launches from Beijing Yizhuang this year will exceed 30 times, with a launch density expected to increase by 130% compared to last year.

Biotechnology and the big health industry are one of the four leading industries in Yizhuang, and many enterprises in the park also reflect the characteristics of the "future health" industry. The talent advantage of Yizhuang has promoted the development of these future industries.

The talent aggregation advantage of Beijing Yizhuang is prominent, with a total talent pool of nearly 400,000; the talent contribution rate is 68.7%, exceeding the talent contribution rate of Beijing City by 11.4%; the number of invention patents per 10,000 people exceeds 850, which is three times the average value per 10,000 people in Beijing.

Beijing Zhiyu Medical Technology Co., Ltd. is a national high-tech enterprise specializing in surgical robots and intelligent diagnostic and treatment equipment. Zhiyu Medical has gathered top talents from the international medical device industry, with the core team coming from leading domestic and international medical industry enterprises such as GE Healthcare.

Zhiyu Medical CTO Chen Wenbo told reporters that one of the important reasons for Zhiyu Medical to choose Yizhuang as its location is that most of the core team members have long worked and lived in Yizhuang and are very familiar with it. At the same time, Yizhuang has a complete industrial support system and support in talent introduction.

Beijing Yizhuang has established a "1+N" industrial policy system in the fields of biotechnology and big health industry. In addition to special industrial policies, Beijing Yizhuang has also introduced "Talent Ten Articles 2.0 Policy," "Science and Innovation Twenty Articles," "Specialized, Special, and New, National High-tech Ten Articles," equipment purchase and renovation, listing rewards, and other inclusive policies, and has established a government investment guidance fund to help the development of enterprises.