A ceremony was successfully held in Huadu on August 1 to celebrate the opening of ZF Guangzhou Technical Center and the ground breaking for ZF Guangzhou Electronics Plant, marking the official opening of ZF's first R&D center in South China, and ZF's second automotive electronics factory in China. The event signifies ZF Group's accelerated transformation into "next-generation mobility", promising enabling new momentum to Guangzhou’s ambition to build a trillion-level automotive smart city as well as to Huadu District’s vision to build an innovation highland of intelligent and connected vehicle in the Greater Bay Area. The event was attended by relevant leaders of Guangzhou Municipal Government, main leaders of Huadu District Party Committee and District Government, Stephen von Schuckmann, Director of ZF Group, Wang Runyi, Executive Vice President, President of China and President of Asia Pacific Operations of ZF Group, and lots of distinguished guests.

　　ZF: Continuous moves in Huadu, Guangzhou 

　　Accelerating the transformation to "next-generation mobility"

　　ZF, a Fortune 500 company, a leading global supplier and technology company in automotive parts, and committed to providing "next-generation mobility" products in the fields of passenger cars, commercial vehicles and industrial technology, built ZF Guangzhou Technical Center and ZF Guangzhou Electronics Plant in Huadu in 2021 and 2023 respectively, continuously injecting super energy into Huadu's automotive industry.

　　As ZF's first R&D center in South China, ZF Guangzhou Technical Center, equipped with core engineering technology R&D capabilities, focused on software development, mechatronics design and other core capabilities, provides customers with ZF's comprehensive technical solutions, such as active safety systems, passive safety systems, autonomous driving and other technologies.

　　ZF Guangzhou Electronics Plant, ZF's second automotive electronics factory in China, will be built into a highly automated, intelligent, global benchmark factory that will continuously increase the capacity of producing intelligent driving and software technology related products. The planned area for the first phase is 12,000 square meters, including the construction of an Industry 4.0 electronics manufacturing workshop with Class 100,000 cleanliness, constant temperature and humidity, and anti-static property. Scheduled to achieve mass production in 2025, the plant's product range covers four product lines: ADAS, high-performance domain controllers, safety electronics, and chassis control.

　　Stephan von Schuckmann, Director of ZF Group, said: "The building of these two marks another breakthrough in our strategy 'in China, for China'. China is one of the leading automotive industry markets in the world that has the most fierce competition and the fastest technology iteration; and we will continue our innovation driven approach and investments in the future. ”

　　The relation between ZF and Huadu District dates back to 2019. After more than one year of repeated consultation and continuous promotion, Huadu District finally emerged victorious from more than 60 candidate areas to become home to ZF Guangzhou Technical Center. During the Covid-19 pandemic, thanks to Huadu District Investment Promotion Office's close follow-up for more than one year, ZF finally selected Huadu again as the place to build its electronics plant over Vietnam, Malaysia, Wuhan, Chengdu and other candidate locations, and a contract was signed in December last year. The next half a year witnessed what is called the "Huadu speed", in which the electronics plant broke ground, and the first phase of ZF Guangzhou Technical Center was completed. The settlement of two major projects in a row in Huadu indicates that the business environment of Huadu District is highly recognized by the Fortune Global 500 company.

　　Huadu District is going all out to plan and build the northern growth pole of Guangzhou at a high level, create a comprehensive gateway and a new power house for high-quality development in northern Guangzhou. Aiming to attract big and strong investments, Huadu District has insisted on centering everything on projects, and done everything with projects in mind; as a result it was rated as an excellent District of Guangzhou in investment promotion for two consecutive years in 2021 and 2022. Since the beginning of this year, Huadu District has actively gone out to "visit to attract investment", requiring that "No.1 leaders" take responsibility for "across-the-board" investment promotion. 32 leaders from the four leading groups (party committee, people's congress, government, and CPPCC) of the District have set out for investment promotion, pledging to attract more than 100 100-million-yuan investment projects; and the innovative investment promotion form of "bidding for project" has been carried out in the District. As a result a synergy for investment promotion was formed and the annual task goal of 550 new negotiation projects was completed five months ahead of schedule. The finalized key projects include Fortune Global 500 company ZF's electronics plant, the 16GW photovoltaic module project invested by a leading domestic new energy enterprise, and Hersio's project of die-casting aluminum parts of new energy vehicles.

　　Careful plan

　　Strongly empowers high-quality development of Guangzhou's automobile industry

　　After being put into use, ZF Guangzhou Technical Center will infuse super impetus for the improvement of the R&D strength of Guangzhou's automobile industry, will greatly make up for its shortcomings in high-end parts such as electronic radar and sensors, and will greatly enhance its comprehensive competitiveness, therefore it will be of great significance to Guangzhou's strategy of building a trillion-level automobile smart city.

　　Wang Runyi, Executive Vice President, President of China and President of Asia Pacific Operations of ZF Group said: "Guangzhou is the innovation center of the automotive industry in South China, and Huadu in particular is a highland for the development of the automotive industry. The opening of the Guangzhou Technical Center and the groundbreaking of ZF Guangzhou Electronics Plant is a landmark of ZF's localization of core R&D and comprehensive supply chain. ZF will continue to increase investment in the Chinese market, and accelerate the localization of the supply chain, especially that of key components, to contribute to the historic transformation of China's automotive industry. ”

　　Relevant leaders of Guangzhou said that as a big supporter of industry development, and a city that treated manufacturing as the foundation, Guangzhou would fully support ZF and other leading enterprises in the automotive industry chain from home and abroad to develop and grow in Guangzhou, and would make every effort to build an industry cluster of intelligent and connected vehicle and new energy vehicle that was led by trillion-yuan-level industry chains and supported by hundred-billion-yuan-level ones, and connected the future, and thus promoted the transformation of "automobile city" into "smart car city".

　　Huadu: Builds an innovation highland of intelligent and connected vehicles in the Greater Bay Area

　　Runs to Guangzhou North Growth Pole at "accelerated speed"

　　The automobile industry is the number one driving force for Huadu's economic growth. Featuring high degree of concentration, sound supporting facilities and complete industrial chain, Huadu reports an annual output value of about 180 billion yuan and an annual production and sales of about 1 million vehicles, accounting for more than 33% of the total output value of Guangzhou's automobile industry.

　　Adhering to the concepts of maintaining the District with intelligent manufacturing and strengthen the District with hubs, Huadu leverages the solid industrial foundation, outstanding hub energy and unlimited development space, and focuses on the automobile industry as the backbone to promote accelerated transformation and development of the automotive industry to new energy and intelligent and connected vehicles, actively move into such strategic emerging industries as new energy vehicles and parts, photovoltaic power, and new energy storage, and strive to build a "200 billion-level automotive industry cluster".