Big reputation as tech innovator soars in nation

China Daily | Updated: 2018-09-19 08:13

Tianjin companies have made technological breakthroughs in key sectors, demonstrating their innovative might and reinforcing the city's status as a national intelligent manufacturing center.

One example is the domestic underwater robot producer Tianjin Sublue Ocean Science & Technology, which says it is confident it can expand its presence in Europe and the United States.

"We have had a significant surge in orders from those two markets this year," said Wei Jiancang, the chief executive of Sublue.

The company said it expects to produce 100,000 underwater scooters and robots for the two markets this year, generating 70 percent of Sublue's sales for the year, said Liu Qi, general manager of Sublue New Scene Technology Co, a subsidiary.

Driven by its strength overseas, the company expects to record sales valued at 262 million yuan ($38.2 million) this year, compared with 90 million yuan last year, Liu said.

Sublue has made autonomous and remote underwater vehicles and gliders since 2013. Previously its products were mainly bought for use in underwater salvage, marine research, disaster prevention and the military.

Sublue began to explore commercial and consumer markets last year, with scooters and underwater robots becoming a new driving force for the company.

Phytium Technology, a chip producer in Tianjin, is also riding high.

Gu Hong, its general manager, said: "The significant surge from the 50 million yuan in sales achieved last year will be driven by the industrial upgrade of State-owned enterprises and wider use of products by government authorities."

The company's present projects include an overall energy upgrade system launched by China Huadian Corp Co and the telecommunications control system for China's high-speed rail. In addition, the company expects more high-speed rail projects in Belt and Road economies such as Indonesia.

The company said it plans to achieve sales of about 10 billion yuan ($1.57 billion) in the next five years.

Substantial progress has been made with China's Tianhe-3 supercomputer with the research and development of its prototype competed recently, Xinhua News Agency reported.

The prototype, jointly developed by the National University of Defense Technology and the National Supercomputer Center in Tianjin, passed tests by the high-tech center of the Ministry of Science and Technology in late July.

The final version of Tianhe-3 will be operational by 2020 and will be 200 times faster and have 100 times more storage capacity than the Tianhe-1 supercomputer, the country's first petaflop supercomputer, launched in 2010, said Liu Guangming, head of the National Supercomputer Center in Tianjin.

"The new-generation exascale supercomputer is expected to become irreplaceable technology, dealing with challenging problems in the fields of economics and science in China," Liu said.

The supercomputer in the Tianjin center will be gradually open for application research, Liu said.

Meng Xiangfei, head of the center's applied research and development department, said: "A high-performance computer service platform integrating supercomputing, cloud computing, big data and artificial intelligence will be built on the basis of the Tianhe-3 supercomputer. It will play an important role in meteorology, aviation, earthquake research, energy exploration, genetic engineering and handling of big data."

Last year investment in technological services in the city rose 76 percent compared with the previous year, official figures showed.

China Daily - Xinhua