Guangzhou's major industrial districts are accelerating efforts to seize a foothold in the robotics sector.

Artificial intelligence and embodied intelligence have become key areas of industrial competition across the country, and Guangzhou is accelerating its efforts to gain an edge.

On July 3rd, Huangpu District, an industrial powerhouse in Guangzhou, released a series of policies on "artificial intelligence + robotics", covering a number of policy measures to support the high - quality development of industries such as artificial intelligence, embodied intelligence, integrated circuits, ultra - high - definition video, and new displays, with a maximum subsidy of 10 million yuan.

Behind the industrial bets lies Guangzhou's urgent need for economic transformation. Due to the issue of transforming old growth drivers into new ones, Guangzhou's economic performance in recent years has not been outstanding, with its GDP growth rate consistently lower than the national and provincial averages.

Huangpu District is an industrial hub in Guangzhou, contributing about 35% of the city's total industrial output value above a designated size. The fuel - powered vehicle industry was previously the mainstay of Huangpu's industrial economy. Constrained by the continuous pressure on automobile manufacturing production, the district only emerged from negative industrial growth at the beginning of this year. However, the weak industrial growth still needs to be addressed. From January to May this year, the total industrial output value above a designated size in Huangpu District reached 315.249 billion yuan, with a growth rate of only 0.9%, while fixed - asset investment declined by 3.6%.

Compared with traditional manufacturing, advanced manufacturing has shown better resilience. In 2024, the output value of advanced manufacturing above a designated size in Huangpu District accounted for 60.6% of the total industrial output value above a designated size in the district. For example, the high - end electronic information manufacturing industry achieved a 2.4% growth.

Huangpu District also established an office for key industrial development this year, covering six key industries: biomedicine, low - altitude economy and aerospace, semiconductors and integrated circuits, artificial intelligence, new energy and new energy storage, and embodied intelligent robots.

Yuan Dieying, the deputy director of the Bureau of Industry and Information Technology of Huangpu District, mentioned in an interview with Jiemian News and other media that in the field of embodied intelligence, the current output value has exceeded 50 billion yuan. The district has also focused on deploying computing power and algorithms, gathering more than 30 large models. In the next step, it will focus on the development of embodied intelligence in areas such as humanoid robots, industrial robots, flight servers, and autonomous driving.

Currently, the district continues to strengthen policy support to build an ecosystem across all links of the industrial chain. For example, in the field of artificial intelligence, "computing power vouchers", "model vouchers", "scenario vouchers", and "data vouchers" will be issued, with subsidy amounts ranging from 1 million yuan to 10 million yuan.

Data is a key element driving the development of the artificial intelligence industry. The training and inference of large models are highly dependent on the supply of high - quality data sets. At the data level, Huangpu District is the core area of the data element agglomeration and development zone in Guangdong Province. It established the first data element industry association in Guangzhou and released two district - level industrial public data products, the only ones in the city, attracting companies such as Guangzhou Data Group, Haizhi Big Data, Boshi Technology, and Jiadu Technology to settle.

The latest policy states that it supports the construction of open - source communities, accelerates the construction of a leading open - source infrastructure for artificial intelligence, lowers the development threshold for the industry, and rewards up to 10 open - source entities with a maximum of 1 million yuan each to encourage open - source models and tools to enter the open - source community.

In addition, in the field of embodied intelligence, it will build characteristic industrial parks and deepen the application of "robot +". Innovative and entrepreneurial enterprises in the field of embodied intelligent robots can be provided with thousands of square meters of office, R & D, and production space when they settle in the flagship park.

Li Yongwei, the director of the Business Environment Reform Bureau of Guangzhou Development District, pointed out in an interview with Jiemian News and other media that there are more than 300 industrial parks in the district, contributing nearly one - third of the enterprises above a designated size. The next key task is to standardize and guide the development of industrial parks.

Li Yongwei mentioned that "there are problems such as disorderly competition and homogeneous competition among the more than 300 parks. A scientific evaluation system is needed to standardize development, and relevant mechanisms are expected to be introduced in August. In the early stage, we also visited and learned from the park management models in areas such as Zhangjiang in Shanghai and Yizhuang in Beijing. Next, we will combine the World Bank's indicator system with local - characteristic indicator systems, including industrial agglomeration, plot ratio, and investment promotion, to set indicators for the parks. Then the parks can focus on these indicators to avoid involution - style competition to increase the rental rate."

On July 3rd, Deng Xu, the director of the Bureau of Industry and Information Technology of Huangpu District, revealed at a meeting that in the fields of artificial intelligence and robotics, the district has gathered 219 key artificial intelligence enterprises, with an industrial scale exceeding 50 billion yuan. The intelligent computing power supply is nearly 10,000P, and more than 30 industry - specific vertical models such as CSG Power's Big Watt, CVTE of Shiyuan Electronics, and Wangdao of GRG Banking Equipment have been incubated. 133 artificial intelligence application scenarios have been opened.

Jiemian News found through sorting that the current robot products in Huangpu District are mainly special - purpose robots, focusing on niche scenarios such as patrol and inspection, medical services, and flat - surface cleaning. The "robot nurse" of Saiter Intelligent can perform environmental disinfection and logistics distribution in hospital scenarios and is planned to be delivered to Queen Mary Hospital in Hong Kong. The small quadruped net - capturing robot dog of Jiecchuang Intelligent can assist in security patrols and remotely launch net - capturing restraints. The neurosurgical navigation and positioning system of Aimuyi Technology is mainly used for surgical guidance.

Li Mingjie, the person in charge of domestic market sales at Lingdu Intelligent, which specializes in flat - surface cleaning robots, told Jiemian News that 300 units of the product have been delivered so far. The company has exclusive agents in countries such as the United States, South Korea, Malaysia, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates. "In these places, labor costs are high, and water conservation is highly valued, so the acceptance of robots is higher."

Li Mingjie said, "The current delivery volume is not large, and there are still some limitations. Currently, it can only clean smooth and flat glass surfaces. In the next stage, the industry is trying to break through in concave and diamond - shaped surface scenarios, which can greatly expand the market space."

To incubate more complete - machine enterprises, investment promotion and policy support are the main means. At the just - concluded 11th Guangzhou International Investment Annual Conference, 47 projects, including that of Biren Technology in Huangpu District, were signed, with a total investment of about 36.1 billion yuan and an estimated output value and revenue of about 54.6 billion yuan after reaching production capacity, both ranking first in the city.

Liu Pinpin, the deputy director of the Investment Promotion Center of Guangzhou Development District, said in response to a question from Jiemian News that in the future, more efforts will be made in "large - ecosystem" investment promotion, "full - factor" investment promotion, and "multi - channel" investment promotion. Relying on the large - scale fixed - asset investment construction volume of over 200 billion yuan in the district each year, more scenario - based impetus will be provided for artificial intelligence and embodied intelligence. "Investment promotion with land" and "investment promotion with buildings" will be implemented for key projects, and at the same time, the practice of "joint land acquisition and joint building construction" by enterprises related to the industrial chain will be promoted.

In the field of embodied intelligence, the policy proposes to provide a maximum comprehensive support of 50 million yuan for major projects in the embodied intelligent robot industry with overall driving effects; build characteristic industrial parks to provide up to 1,000 square meters of free office, R & D, and production space for innovative and entrepreneurial enterprises in the field of embodied intelligence; cultivate high - end self - owned brands, promote the industrialization of complete - machine manufacturing enterprises, and provide a maximum subsidy of 1 million yuan, with the subsidy amount for humanoid robot enterprises increased to 3 million yuan.

Leveraging government investment funds for investment promotion is another advantage that the government can utilize. Huangpu District has integrated the original talent guidance fund, direct equity investment funds, and other policy - based funds funded by finance to establish a district - level science and technology innovation and entrepreneurship investment mother fund with a total scale of 5 billion yuan. Through the "sub - fund + direct investment" approach, it will focus on investing in innovative and entrepreneurial technology enterprises in strategic emerging industries.

Yu Zheng, the founder of Jiangsu Wenshi Technology Co., Ltd., intends to launch relevant businesses in Huangpu District, Guangzhou. The company is headquartered in Nanjing and specializes in large models for the energy and power sector. Yu Zheng told Jiemian News that the company currently has financing needs, and the district's government industrial funds can provide support. "The district government has been paying attention to our company. However, since the district's mother fund cannot lead the investment, we are still in the process of connecting with social capital." He also mentioned that another consideration for the company to settle in Guangzhou is market - driven, as a large part of its daily business focuses on the power grid, and China Southern Power Grid is an important customer.

Currently, there are more than 900 venture capital and private equity investment institutions in Huangpu District, with a total asset management scale of over 270 billion yuan. The total scale of the AIC pilot equity investment funds established in the district exceeds 12 billion yuan.

Mei Shaocheng, the deputy director of the State - owned Assets Bureau of Guangzhou Development District, mentioned at the press conference that to provide long - term capital support for the industry, in terms of direct investment, according to the investment stage, seed direct investment, angel direct investment, and industrial direct investment are allowed to have a maximum loss of no more than 50%, 40%, and 30% of the total investment amount in each category respectively. Seed direct investment and angel direct investment are allowed to have a maximum loss of 100% for a single project.

This article is from Jiemian News, reporter: Zhang Xilong. Republished by 36Kr with permission.