A quadruped robot is proving remarkably capable, equipped with visible light, infrared, gas and other sensors that instantly alert the central control platform upon detecting微量 leaks in monitored targets.

At the Yangtze River Delta Center of the Embodied Intelligence Testing Laboratory in Shangyu District, Shaoxing City, Zhejiang Province, this quadruped robot completed a 15-day real-world chemical industry assessment and obtained national-level testing certification before officially starting work at the liquid chlorine production workshop of Zhejiang Runtu New Materials Co., Ltd.

Fu Zairong, the company's executive deputy general manager, said, "With robots, personnel exposure time in high-risk areas has been reduced by 90%, improving safety while also boosting efficiency."

The Political Bureau of the CPC Central Committee meeting held on July 30 emphasized "deepening the 'AI Plus' initiative and developing new forms of the intelligent economy." Shangyu District has already introduced 20 embodied intelligence industry projects with total investment exceeding 15 billion yuan, and leading industry projects are accelerating their clustering.

With relatively weak scientific research capabilities and limited appeal to talent, how can the district compete in this new track? Shangyu's answer is to adapt to local conditions, promote deep integration of technological and industrial innovation, and focus the breakthrough point for embodied intelligence development on industrialization and implementation.

Expanding development foundations through scenario openness

By the end of 2025, relevant departments in Shangyu District visited and surveyed more than 110 chemical enterprises, identifying six typical scenarios including safety inspections and hazardous operation supervision, and selected five companies including Runtu New Materials to carry out robot intelligent inspection pilots.

Overcoming complex working conditions such as high temperatures and strong electromagnetic interference, 40 data collection robots continuously gathered production information, acquiring over 150,000 high-precision operational data entries that were fed into the embodied intelligence data foundation.

Robots gradually mastered professional skills such as reading instruments and detecting leaks. Embodied intelligence robot enterprises rooted in production scenarios have polished more mature intelligent equipment, training models in vertical fields to make traditional chemical industrial parks safer and smarter.

Rather than competing on models, the district competes on scenarios; rather than competing on computing power, it competes on manufacturing; rather than pursuing comprehensiveness, it pursues distinctive features. Shangyu adheres to a development path driven by scenario traction and supported by manufacturing.

At the beginning of this year, Shangyu District established a Scenario Cultivation and Application Office to support the development of embodied intelligence and other industries.

Cultivating transformation advantages through ecosystem collaboration

In the production workshop of Wolong Electric Drive Group Co., Ltd., joint motors roll off the assembly line in an orderly manner. They will be sent to the Shangyu production base of Zhejiang Zhiding Robot Co., Ltd. to drive the flexible movement of robot limbs.

"After more than 40 years in motor manufacturing, facing the wave of artificial intelligence development, we urgently need to find new breakthroughs for traditional manufacturing," acknowledged Pang Xinyuan, chairman of Wolong Electric Drive Group.

With the Shangyu District government acting as a bridge, the enterprise collaborated with complete robot manufacturers to tackle key problems and clear bottlenecks in upstream and downstream coordination. In 2025, Wolong Electric Drive Group's joint motor and module orders achieved rapid growth, allowing the established manufacturer to develop a "second growth curve."

Meanwhile, the lightweight high-strength special materials developed by Zhejiang Zhongxin Fluorine Materials Co., Ltd. can be used for key robot components and hold certain competitive advantages in the market.

In Shangyu District, a complete embodied intelligence industry support system is taking shape at an accelerated pace, and the local manufacturing foundation is continuously transforming into development advantages.

A number of benchmark embodied intelligence enterprises such as Zhiyuan Innovation, Yifei Technology and Qiteng Robotics have successively established operations, and the Shaoxing Embodied Intelligence Comprehensive Service Center with total investment exceeding 150 million yuan has been put into use. Shangyu District has built an integrated support system covering testing certification, command and dispatch, scenario experience, and pilot-scale training.

"Developing future industries does not require starting from scratch; taking root in existing industrial foundations can also achieve overtaking on a new track," said Qian Linjiang, Party Secretary of Shangyu District. He stated that Shangyu District will persist in combining "platform, industry, scenario and ecosystem" efforts to continuously gather industrial resources and consolidate development momentum.