By Deng Wentao，iChongqing News

Chongqing — Andreas Gerstenmayer, CEO and Chairman of the Management Board of AT&S, and Chen Jiang Phua, CEO of AT&S Business Unit Mobile Devices & Substances discussed their parent company’s role at the Chongqing Mayor’s International Economic Advisory Council September 27th, 2019.

AT&S CEO attended the 14 Annual CMIA in Chongqing.

AT&S is a global manufacturer of IC Substrates and high value printed circuit boards is used across a variety of industries including, communications, automotive, mobile devices, and medical. The AT&S, which made 1bn Euros in profit worldwide last year, has operated in China for 20 years expanding to Chongqing in 2012.

During the 14th annual meeting, Gerstenmayer expects to discuss a range of potential areas of development going forward such as how to digitalize, streamline the industrial value chain, partner with universities to increase talent development and supply in China. Educating the workforce of tomorrow will be essential in sustaining and expanding growth in the tech sectors of China, he said. One way to ensure an adequate future workforce is to support progressive change in curriculum that will help sustain the industry in the future. “Strengthening our relations with the local science society is the next important step,” he said adding, “Computing, cloud computing data center all need to be established to support future development of Chongqing will all be the core for future digitalization of the country,” he said.

“AT&S hopes to be apart of that digitalization. We are producing technologies that are core to the commuting industry. Regarding university cooperation we are pleased to announce that we signed a cooperation agreement with the Chinese government” which will contribute to further development, he said.

Gerstenmayer noted that a lot of logistics and infrastructure has been built up for the last ten years and that it has has been essential and that there should be renewed focus to make transportation infrastructure more efficient, take advantage of new technologies to reduce the carbon footprint. “There is a baseline for further development, and I look forward to discussing it more over the next few days,” he said.

When asked about the economic slow down in China and how it would affect the company’s investment strategy Gerstenmayer was optimistic, “The slow down in China, is represented of the economic cycle and as is no need for alarm. Our investment strategy is related to the industry that we are in. AI, big data, will be essential to the future, this is where we are investing our money and where we are creating capacities here in Chongqing.”

“It’s always a risk when you open a factory,” said Gerstenmayer, but the great support from the local and national government has proved that establishing their production in Chongqing with sufficient infrastructure and skilled people “was a good decision,” he said.

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