The Information Office of Shanghai Municipality held a municipal government press conference today (July 8) during which Wu Jincheng, director of the Shanghai Municipal Commission of Economy and Informatization introduced the　three action plans for promoting the development of green and low-carbon industries, cultivating new growth tracks on “Metaverse”, and advancing the high-quality development of the smart terminal industry. Qiu Wenjin, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Development and Reform Commission, Wang Ye, deputy director of the Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Commission, and Wu Qiang, deputy head of Pudong New Area, attended the press conference and answered questions from reporters.

Capturing new tracks and cultivating new momentum is a strategic priority for Shanghai to build its future growth advantages, and also an important starting point to accelerate economic recovery and revitalization. According to requirements of the CPC Shanghai Municipal Committee and the Shanghai Municipal Government to improve planning of the “new tracks” and strengthen the “bottom-up” motivation, the city has formulated three action plans for green and low-carbon industries, Metaverse, and smart terminal industry.

1.General considerations on the layout of new tracks and new momentum

To advance the layout of new tracks and new momentum in Shanghai, the city prioritizes several growth orientations: First, they should feature forward-looking significance. For example, intelligence, eco-friendliness, and health are not only the general trends of global industrial innovation and development, but also the strategic priorities in the country’s overall planning. Second, they should feature the breadth to empower a myriad of industries. For example, Metaverse will drive the transformation and upgrading of various industries in the real economy via the integration of virtual and real scenarios. And smart terminals can drive the overall iteration of the upstream industry chain. Third, they should feature the speed of continuous explosive growth. For example, Metaverse and smart terminals are expected to continuously foster new business formats and models, as well as blockbuster applications and products, thus unleashing huge market value. The three new industrial tracks on green and low-carbon, Metaverse, and smart terminals will be the future priorities and growth drivers of Shanghai’s “3 plus 6” new industry system, and will diversify, enrich and expand the scope of Shanghai’s industrial development.

2.The main contents of the relevant action plans

(1)Seize the opportunities in six aspects and promote the high-quality development of green and low-carbon industries　

The national strategy of “carbon peaking” and “carbon neutrality” contains a lot of technological innovation and industry opportunities. Shanghai will grasp the development trends in six aspects, namely clean energy, low-carbon raw materials, functional materials, process efficiency, terminal electrification and resource recycling to deliver on three major actions, namely cultivating green and low-carbon industries, upgrading special parks, and improving industry ecosystem. By 2025, the industrial scale will exceed 500 billion yuan, by basically forming a development pattern of two 100-billion, five 10-billion and many 1-billion industrial clusters. Efforts will be made to cultivate 10 leading green and low-carbon enterprises, 100 core enterprises and 1,000 special companies.

The action plan on the green and low-carbon industry will focus on the development of 10 areas around four key priorities. First, it will focus on the high-end of the industry to lead in the tracks with competitive edges. The city will explore cutting-edge technologies such as negative carbon, new energy, and high-efficiency energy storage, while speeding up independent research on key components of high-end equipment such as heavy-duty gas turbines, nuclear energy, and wind energy. The city will support key energy-using industries and data centers to achieve extreme energy efficiency, while exploring hydrogen-rich blast furnaces for carbon neutrality and other advanced low-carbon metallurgy technology to bolster the green and high-quality steel sector. Second, it will promote the development of clusters and expand parallel tracks. The city will build a technology and product supply system for key components of new energy vehicles, and develop a power battery recycling industry. It will establish a diverse supply system for hydrogen energy, and seek breakthroughs in key technologies such as long-life stacks for fuel cells. Third, it will expand application scenarios and capture opportunities in emerging tracks. The city will accelerate the promotion and application of green materials such as carbon fibers, high-temperature superconductors, and photocatalytic materials. It will foster carbon trading and carbon finance, encourage financial institutions to participate in and activate the carbon financial market, and promote innovation and market entry for carbon financial derivatives in an orderly manner. Fourth, it will improve integration and innovation to achieve corner overtaking. The city will improve the impact of innovative applications such as carbon capture and applications and smart grids.

At the same time, the city will implement the key action on building special parks, with a focus on hydrogen energy, high-end energy equipment, low-carbon metallurgy, green materials, energy conservation and environmental protection to cultivate “5 plus X” green and low-carbon special parks. Also, it will implement the action to improve the industry ecosystem, with an aim to promote the development of innovative entities and platforms in the green and low-carbon field, advance the coordinated development along the industrial chain, and speed up the construction of the standard system.　

(2)Persist in leveraging virtual industries to bolster the real economy, and cultivate and expand new momentum for the development of the Metaverse

Metaverse is a key platform for interaction between the virtual world and the real society in the future. It is a new manifestation of the digital economy with huge potential. The city will be guided by the principle of developing both virtual and real sectors and leveraging virtual industries to bolster the real economy, while giving full play to Shanghai’s advantages in 5G, data factors, application scenarios, and online new economy, to enable Metaverse to better empower digital transformation of the economy, life, and governance. The city will strive to foster 10 companies with global competitiveness and 100 companies with special expertise and innovation capabilities. It will also launch more than 50 demonstration scenarios and more than 100 benchmark products and services, with an aim to enable the industry scale to reach 350 billion yuan by 2025.

Specifically, the city will focus on the implementation of “Four Actions and Eight Projects.” For example, the action on construction of the industrial highland will focus on holographic display, future-oriented network, VR/AR/MR terminals, and 3D image engines to improve supply capacity of the industries. The action on empowerment with model integration will focus on supporting the development of “Metaverse plus factory”, healthcare, entertainment, office and other scenarios. The other two actions will focus on digital format upgrading and innovation ecosystem cultivation. As for the eight projects, the project on key technology breakthroughs will focus on funding and awarding enterprises for scientific achievements and transformation they make. The project on cultivation of the digital IP market will focus on supporting Shanghai Data Exchange to open a digital asset trading section on a pilot basis and promoting the standardized development of the digital creative industry. The project on cultivation of innovative industrial carriers will focus on developing a number of special Industrial parks. There are also projects on comprehensive capability improvement of digital professionals, digital twin space, and digital space risk governance

While promoting the development and growth of the industries, the city will strictly guard against excessive financial speculation and malicious speculation in the Metaverse field to ensure the healthy and orderly development of these industries.

(3) Highlight brand building and accelerate smart terminals to drive economic transformation and upgrading

The city will focus on building well-known terminal brands and a self-sustaining terminal ecosystem. It will strive to develop intelligent terminals such as intelligent connected vehicles, intelligent robots, virtual reality interaction, smart home applications, and smart wearable devices. By 2025, the industrial scale is expected to reach more than 700 billion yuan, with at least two companies with revenue of 100 billion yuan each, at least 5 companies with revenue of 10 billion yuan each, and at least 20 companies with revenue of 1 billion yuan each. The city aims to create more than 10 extremely popular intelligent connected vehicles, and more than 100 intelligent terminal products in 10 major application scenarios such as transportation, elderly care, and healthcare.

In the field of intelligent connected vehicles, the city will support traditional car companies, new car manufacturers and technology companies to capture the consumption trend and create popular brands with Shanghai identity. The city will accelerate the delivery and promotion of commercial terminals such as unmanned taxis, smart buses, and smart heavy trucks. The city will advance the development of test demonstrations and commercial operations. It will accelerate the research and development of core systems for smart driving, smart interconnectivity and smart cabins, while building intelligent roads, and speeding up the development of the Internet of Vehicles. The city will cultivate smart mobility and data services, and promote cooperation between vehicle companies, technology companies, and social media platforms. The city will foster a new industry ecosystem, and accelerate the construction of smart factories. The city will further leverage digital empowerment, and promote the applications of intelligent robots and digital twin technologies. The city will support smart strategic transformation of traditional car companies, strive to attract new car manufacturers and technology companies to set up headquarters in Shanghai, and cultivate emerging industry leaders.　

In the field of intelligent robots, the city will support key projects on key components for motion, perception and control systems. It will support the development and growth of industrial robots in the field of high precision and flexible interaction. It will expand the application scenarios of service robots for cleaning, healthcare, distribution and life. It will promote “service leasing plus system integration” business model.

In the field of virtual reality interaction, the city will focus on improving hardware maturity, seeking breakthroughs on key technologies such as near-eye display, perceptual interaction, network transmission, and rendering processing, while promoting the applications of terminals in scenarios like games and entertainment, education and training, industrial testing, and telemedicine.

In the field of smart home appliances, the city will support the development of smart speakers, smart kitchen appliances, smart door locks, smart light bulbs and other household items, with an aim to provide user-centered full-scenario smart services.

In the field of smart wearable devices, the city will focus on the “silver economy” and promote the development of wearables and sports equipment for the elderly. The city will also focus on the “health economy” by promoting the development of smart bracelets and smart watches.

Efforts will be made to consolidate software and hardware infrastructure for intelligent terminals, facilitate breakthroughs in high-end chips like high-performance CPUs and automotive-grade MCUs, smart core components for intelligent connected vehicles like batteries, motors and electronic controls as well as basic software, to improve the resilience of the industrial chain and supply chain.

In order to ensure high-quality development of the above new tracks and industries, a series of policies and measures will be put forward in terms of organization and coordination, financial support, carrier planning, talent introduction and cultivation, and open collaboration. For example, the industry map 2022 will be updated and released, the spatial layout will be optimized around new industries and new tracks, and a number of special industrial parks will be launched. The city will also increase talent incentives in line with relevant regulations, and strive to cultivate and lure inter-disciplinary talents and innovative teams. The city will initiate the establishment of a 10-billion-yuan Metaverse industry fund and support innovative companies to go public. The city will strengthen international cooperation, create a batch of “Shanghai standards” and “Shanghai brands” with global influence, and aim to achieve a total industry scale of more than 1.5 trillion yuan for green and low-carbon, Metaverse, and smart terminal industries by 2025.