Building China into a strong manufacturing power

In May 2015, the Chinese government unveiled its first 10-year national plan for transforming China’s manufacturing, entitled “Made in China 2025”. Progresses were made in various aspects since the paper was released, which played an important role in stabilizing industrial growth and speeding up manufacturing transformation and upgrading. R&D on CEMU achieved a breakthrough and had launched trial run, China’s C919, the country’s first domestically built large passenger jet, successfully completed its maiden flight on May, high precision CNC gear grinding machines with independent IPR have gained global market recognition. All these showed that as an important part of the plan, IPR had offered an inexhaustible driving force for accelerating the transformation of China from a big manufacturing power to a strong manufacturing power.

An inside watcher told CIP News that a number of innovators have strengthened IPR accumulation for core technologies in manufacturing key fields in accordance with the plan since its release. Now, these innovators have accomplished initial patent portfolio and layout guided by industrialization. Also, a certain number of IPR advantage enterprises have been fostered.

According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), the five major programs had yielded initial results. Taking the high-end equipment innovation for example, it includes R&D on new large aircraft, civilian space programme, new energy automobile and high-end medical equipments, which are closely bound up with civilian life. To promote long-term development in these sectors, the plan clearly put forward the target of improving market share of high-end equipment with IPR and lowering technological dependence of foreign technologies. To do so, a number of Chinese companies have carried out useful attempts.

Not long ago, the C919 made its debut flight in Shanghai, a breakthrough in the country’s innovation and manufacturing drive, attracting worldwide attention. According to Wu Guanghui, chief designer of Commercial Aircraft Corporation of China (COMAC), C919 is China’s first home-made large passenger plane and its overall designs own independent IPR. Up to now, COMAC has filed more than 1000 patent applications worldwide and the COMAC’s partners own more than 30,000 patents. “All these are of great significance to building an innovative nation and a manufacturing power. Also, they play an important role in advancing supply-side structural reform. ”Wu says.

A few days earlier, State Grid Jiangsu Electric Power Company accomplished debugging and startup of the 1000 KV alternating current system in Taizhou, Jiangsu province, which is the first Ultra High Voltage (UHV) convertor station in the world. According to a representative from patent department under State Grid, for a long time, several transnational companies monopolized the UHV alternating current transmission technology. As efforts to overcome UHV alternating current transmission technology development bottleneck in China, State Grid decided to develop China’s own UHV alternating current transmission technology. Relying on existing scientific foundation, State Grid organized related firms, universities and research institutes to develop related technologies and carry out patent layout in key fields. Meanwhile, measures had been undertaken to promote patent industrialization via patent transfer and license. Due to the efforts on IPR accumulation and operation, not only the core competitiveness of UHV industry in China has been improved, but also the infringement risks have been avoided. Meanwhile, giving the credit to the technology development, prices of high-end transmission and conversion products in China have been effectively restrained.

Manufacturing is the main force of national economy and remains the foundation for building, rejuvenating and strengthening a county. The rising and falling history of world powers since modern times show that building powerful manufacturing is the only way of improving comprehensive national strength, ensuring national security and building into a world power. The achievements made since the release of Made in China 2025 show that highly effective IPR layout and operation is of great concern in improving manufacturing industrial competitiveness. Just as an inside watcher says, the ten key sectors formulated by the plan all require high innovation, as a result, related practitioners should carry out the IPR layout as soon as possible so as to take a preemptive opportunity in future competition.