On January 7, eight departments, including the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, jointly released the "Implementation Opinions on the Special Action of 'Artificial Intelligence + Manufacturing'" (hereinafter referred to as the "Implementation Opinions"), aiming to accelerate the integration and application of artificial intelligence technology in manufacturing, create new-quality productivity, and empower new industrialization in a comprehensive, in-depth, and high-level manner.
The "Implementation Opinions" propose that by 2027, my country will achieve a safe and reliable supply of key core technologies for artificial intelligence, with its industrial scale and empowerment level ranking among the world's top. It aims to promote the deep application of 3-5 general-purpose large-scale models in manufacturing, forming specialized and comprehensive industry-specific large-scale models, creating 100 high-quality datasets in industrial fields, and promoting 500 typical application scenarios. It also aims to cultivate 2-3 globally influential ecosystem-leading enterprises and a number of specialized and innovative SMEs, create a group of empowerment application service providers who "understand intelligence and are familiar with industries," and select 1,000 benchmark enterprises. Furthermore, it aims to build a globally leading open-source ecosystem, comprehensively improve security governance capabilities, and contribute Chinese solutions to the development of artificial intelligence.
Regarding specific measures, the "Implementation Opinions" clearly state the need to strengthen the supply of artificial intelligence computing power. Promote the coordinated development of intelligent chip hardware and software, and support breakthroughs in key technologies such as high-end training chips, edge inference chips, artificial intelligence servers, high-speed interconnection, and intelligent computing cloud operating systems. Orderly advance the deployment of high-level intelligent computing facilities, accelerate the construction of a national integrated computing power network monitoring and scheduling platform, and promote the efficient utilization of computing resources. Conduct pilot projects for intelligent computing cloud services, promote the deployment of large-scale integrated models, edge computing servers, and industrial cloud computing power, and enhance the supply capacity of intelligent computing resources.
-Accelerate the application empowerment of key industries. Deepen the "Deep Dive" activity of empowering new industrialization with artificial intelligence, and organize high-level experts, enterprises, research institutions, and other empowerment service teams to go deep into industries, localities, and industrial parks. Build an artificial intelligence application docking platform to promote precise matching of supply and demand. Referring to the "Guidelines for Artificial Intelligence Empowering the Transformation of Key Manufacturing Industries," formulate a categorized panoramic view and transformation roadmap for "Artificial Intelligence + Manufacturing" industry applications, accelerate the empowerment of key manufacturing industries such as raw materials, equipment manufacturing, consumer goods, electronic information, software, and information technology services, and accelerate the promotion and application of benchmark solutions and experiences.
-Promote the iteration of intelligent equipment. Accelerate the integration of intelligent agents into various industrial equipment such as industrial machine tools and industrial robots; develop a new generation of AI-powered numerical control systems to enhance autonomous decision-making, analysis, and execution capabilities. Accelerate the development of surgical robots and intelligent diagnostic systems, and expedite the innovation and clinical application of intelligent medical equipment. Promote the integration of AI technology into the research, development, manufacturing, and operation of major technological equipment such as large aircraft and ships; and develop intelligent low-altitude equipment such as drones. Conduct testing and safety assessments of intelligent connected vehicles equipped with autonomous driving functions, and orderly advance product access and road testing pilots.
-Cultivate enterprises in stages. Support enterprises to increase investment in innovation, actively undertake major national tasks, and pool resources to build globally influential ecosystem-leading enterprises. Develop AI enterprise incubators, implement SME entrepreneurship support programs, and cultivate more AI-specialized, refined, and innovative "little giant" enterprises, high-tech enterprises, manufacturing single-item champion enterprises, unicorn enterprises, and gazelle enterprises in stages. Encourage relevant local governments to provide enterprises with support such as "computing power vouchers" and "model vouchers," strengthen public services for empowering SMEs, and reduce the development and application costs for enterprises.
-Promote open source and openness. The document calls for building a high-level open-source AI community, deploying and implementing a number of high-quality open-source projects including models, datasets, and intelligent agents, and constructing an open AI ecosystem with global influence. It also calls for holding developer conferences and "University-Source Journeys" to disseminate open-source concepts and foster an open-source culture. Support will be provided for the development of open-source tools such as development kits and model applications to promote the application of open-source AI achievements.
Regarding support measures, the document requires establishing a working mechanism for inter-departmental cooperation, central-local government collaboration, and industry synergy. Local governments are encouraged to formulate policies and measures tailored to their specific circumstances, guiding enterprises towards differentiated development and preventing "involutionary" competition within the industry. Existing funding channels will be coordinated to support R&D and application tasks related to "AI + Manufacturing." The National Artificial Intelligence Industry Investment Fund will be leveraged to enrich the reserve of high-quality projects and attract more social capital to increase investment in an orderly manner.
