Entrepreneurs champion the idea of "made in China 2025"

Entrepreneurs and CEOs from the World's leading companies have gathered for a meeting of the 2017 Boao Forum for Asia to debate opportunities and challenges facing their businesses and sectors in the future.

CRI reporter Guo Yan takes a closer look at the event to see how these entrepreneurs are embracing the idea of the fourth industrial revolution.

Zeng Qinghong, director of Guangzhou Automobile Group Co., a leading carmaker in China, says intelligent manufacturing helps Chinese entrepreneurs, especially in traditional industry, to transform their business models.

"The key word here is intelligent manufacturing. We are making efforts to seek ways to making our products and services more intelligent. We are now carrying out experiments on products related to driverless cars and we are testing this project in some cities and on some highways. For companies in traditional fields, if they wanna transform and achieve growth in the future, I think intelligent manufacturing could help realize the goal."

Zeng added that his company also faces huge challenges, including rising costs in research and development, and a shortage of talents in the field of cutting-edge technology.

China's central government has unveiled a 10-year plan for upgrading the country's manufacturing sector so it can catch up with production powerhouses like Germany and America.

The "Made in China 2025" plan hopes to give the country an edge in making good products and quality brands.

The Chinese authorities say favorable policies will be rolled out to help underpin the plan.

Bernard Charles speaks during a meeting of the 2017 Boao Forum for Asia in Hainan province on March 24, 2017. [Photo: boaoforum.org]

Bernard Charles is CEO of Dassault Systemes, a leading 3d software maker.

He believes the strategy of "Made in China 2025" can help upgrade China's manufacturing capacity and companies will see huge opportunities and new growth from the transformation.

"We are building a new work force for the future. I think that's where China can leverage. China has a great population that wants to learn more and find new solutions. And I think manufacturing 2025 is a great program to make this possible. We have a new generation changing the industry and this is good. There are spaces for entrepreneurs."

Niklas Gustavsson speaks during a meeting of the 2017 Boao Forum for Asia in Hainan province on March 24, 2017. [Photo: boaoforum.org]

Niklas Gustavsson is the chief sustainability officer of Volvo, a leading Swedish automaker.

He plays down the idea of completely separating the emerging high-tech sector from traditional industry, and points to the major role that innovations such as virtual reality is playing in more traditional industries such as transport.

"We can see today, maybe not as visibly as clear as new games for instance, new virtue really games but actually we have a lot of examples on how it's integrated into new trucks and buses and in construction equipment for instance."

The business leader also notes that with the help of new technologies like artificial intelligence, electro-mobility and virtual reality, society can evolve in a positive way.

The businessman also suggests that he's very much interested in China's strategy of enhancing manufacturing capacity, known as "made in China 2025", and expects to see more business opportunities and cooperation projects running in the country as a result.

For CRI, this is Guo Yan.