Recently, the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Economy and Information Technology officially released the 2025 list of certified Future Factories, Smart Factories, and Digital Workshops in Zhejiang Province. Ningbo Iron & Steel Co., Ltd. was selected as a “Pioneering” Future Factory for its outstanding achievements in intelligent transformation, establishing itself as a benchmark enterprise in the intelligent manufacturing sector of Zhejiang's steel industry.

Since launching the “Ningbo Iron & Steel High-End New Materials Future Factory” initiative in 2021, the company has consistently pursued a three-pronged approach: intelligent operations, collaborative management, and smart decision-making. This has enabled the systematic development of a comprehensive digital ecosystem spanning the entire production lifecycle. A dedicated task force led by senior management and involving cross-departmental collaboration was established, creating an efficient coordination mechanism that ensured the project's successful implementation.

In practical implementation, Ningbo Iron & Steel has deeply integrated platform-based, mobile, data-driven, and customized technologies to develop over 20 high-value application scenarios. These include the embodied intelligent inspection robot “Ning Xiaotie,” “Integrated R&D-production platform”, “intelligent scrap steel grading system”, and “advanced intelligent scheduling system”. These innovations comprehensively drive the transformation of production models toward data-driven and intelligent collaboration.

Notably, Ningbo Iron & Steel pioneered a “scientist + AI” R&D model. Leveraging industrial big data and material mechanism models, the company achieved a closed-loop system integrating forward product design and reverse simulation, significantly boosting R&D efficiency and reducing development cycles by approximately 30%. Simultaneously, the company has established a “mass customization + flexible agile manufacturing” system, driving integrated production-sales management. This has reduced delivery cycles to under 10 days and increased per-capita production efficiency by over 10%, effectively achieving cost reduction, quality improvement, and efficiency gains.

This recognition as a Zhejiang Province “Leading-Type” Future Factory signifies Ningbo Iron & Steel's breakthrough progress in the digital transformation of traditional manufacturing. The company has pioneered an intelligent development path tailored to the steel industry, providing valuable practical experience for the sector's high-quality development.