China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology says it has established
a four-tier intelligent-factory system to scale smart factory construction and
push firms from digitization and networking to intelligence. The system
includes basic, advanced, excellence and leading tiers: about 35,000
basic-level, over 8,200 advanced-level and more than 500 excellence-level smart
factories, with 15 firms named to a leading-level cultivation list; pilots
include shared manufacturing for construction machinery, island-style automotive
production and agile customization for home appliances. Since the rollout of the
tiered cultivation initiative, average product defect rates have fallen 47% and
average product R&D cycles have shortened 38%.
