Chongqing’s Global Observers ③: Innovating for Industrial Development

Chongqing- "As long as Chongqing has a strong automotive base, it will always attract foreign investment capital," said James Wemyss, Director at Chongqing Stone Tan Financial Leasing Co.

Wemyss, an American living in Chongqing, China, believes that the automotive industry is a global industry, and many companies are interested in selling cars to the Chinese market.

In recent years, the trend of software-defined cars has penetrated the automotive value chain. Intelligent transformation in the automotive industry has accelerated around the world. China's smart car enterprises have risen rapidly to get ahead.

Chongqing is a major automobile manufacturing city in China. Now it has 41 automobile manufacturers, which has formed an industrial cluster led by Changan Automobile and supported by thousands of enterprises.

Changan Automobile took the lead in setting up its global software center at Chongqing Xiantao International Big Data Valley in May 2020, aiming to build the largest software technology and intelligent mobile platform in China.

Its global software center has become the first independent software enterprise set by a large state-owned car enterprise in China, which remarks as a significant move in the intelligent transformation of Chongqing's automobile industry.

Changan is leading the way in smart technology and manufacturing in the automotive industry. (Chongqing file photo)

"We always want to see new investments here in Chongqing, with companies either building new factories or new production lines," said Wemyss. 

He thinks that the automotive industry is something that Chongqing has to keep focusing on, which will allow Chongqing to have a very healthy economy in the future.

Chongqing's manufacturing industry has the basic conditions and industrial advantages to develop the Industrial Internet and can provide diversified application scenarios. (iChongqing/ Vivian Yan)

(Wang Lu, as an intern, also contributed to this report.)