The 2021 Sino-German Intelligent Manufacturing Conference is held in Taizhou, East China's Zhejiang province on June 10. [Photo/taizhou.com.cn]

The 2021 Sino-German Intelligent Manufacturing Conference was recently held in Taizhou, East China's Zhejiang province.

The conference, jointly sponsored by the Zhejiang Provincial Department of Economy and Information Technology, the Taizhou Municipal People's Government, the China Center for Information Industry Development, as well as the Sino-German Intelligent Manufacturing Alliance, aims to further strengthen cooperation in smart manufacturing between China and Germany.

Smart manufacturing is an important direction for current and future industrial development, said Wang Jianwei, deputy head of the Department of Information Technology Development at the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

A manufacturing hub in the Yangtze River Delta region, Taizhou which is striving to become a domestic benchmark city for Industry 4.0 could become a spearhead for Sino-German cooperation in smart manufacturing, he added.

Vice Mayor Chen Tingchen noted that Germany and Taizhou have a good foundation for cooperation, given the former is the birthplace and a leader of Industry 4.0, while the latter has the ambition of becoming a manufacturing hub with international influence.

He expressed hope that the two sides will advance exchanges and cooperation, as well as share the fruits of development.

The conference also witnessed the inauguration of a facility in Taizhou to boost Sino-German smart manufacturing cooperation.

More than 300 people, including experts, scholars, as well as businessmen in the smart manufacturing sector from home and abroad, attended the event.

They also visited places including Taizhou Bay New Area Planning Exhibition Hall, Jack Sewing Machine Co Ltd, and Zhejiang Crystal-Optech Co Ltd to explore business opportunities.