On July 14th, a full-page feature in the Economic Daily focused on Hefei, Anhui province, with the title "Paving a Fast Track for Sci-Tech Achievement Transformation – An Investigation into Hefei's Pilot Production Service Development".
On one side, research and development outputs are frequent; on the other, industrial demand is robust. However, bottlenecks persist in connecting R&D outcomes with market needs, and professional sci-tech service support remains insufficient. As a crucial segment of producer services, pilot production services act as an accelerator for manufacturing innovation and a key fulcrum for moving scientific achievements toward market application. In Hefei, Anhui, the reach of these services is expanding, helping cutting-edge technologies exit the laboratory to genuinely serve industrial upgrading and the improvement of people's livelihoods.
From new airline meals and automotive lithium batteries to medical diagnostic equipment and robots for underground pipe networks, a dazzling array of innovative products in Hefei are reaching the broader market after transformation and scaling up through pilot production platforms. These services are a critical link in industrializing scientific and technological achievements, playing a prominent role in accelerating the integrated development of innovation and industrial chains. In recent years, Hefei has focused on key stages of the transformation process, implementing a series of targeted measures. By strengthening and optimizing pilot platforms, the city aims to overcome difficulties and bottlenecks, promoting the local transaction, transformation, and application of scientific achievements to better empower high-quality industrial development.
Initial Steps and Core Functions
How do pilot services accelerate corporate R&D innovation? What roles do pilot platforms play in technology maturation, verification, and market alignment? What is the reference value of Hefei's exploration?
Technical Support Accelerates Product Commercialization
Can strawberries be added to lipstick? Is water spinach tasty as an appetizer? How can cauliflower stems be effectively utilized? These imaginative ideas about agricultural by-product processing found answers at the China Agricultural and Sideline Products Deep Processing Technology Pilot Production and Industrial Incubation City's Anhui headquarters base, located in the Changfeng (Shuangfeng) Economic Development Zone.
"Scientific and technological achievements that haven't undergone pilot production often have a very low industrialization success rate. Pilot production helps companies reduce innovation risks and costs and is seen as a key step in crossing the innovation 'valley of death'," said Shi Qin, Chairman of the Anhui headquarters base. Having worked at a research institute under the Chinese Academy of Sciences before starting his own business, Shi has a deep understanding of entrepreneurial risks and the importance of the pilot stage.
"Pilot production is an unavoidable process for new products heading to market," Shi stated frankly. Many entrepreneurs are unfamiliar with it, believing good ideas and channels alone guarantee investment success, only to face high trial-and-error costs when things don't go as planned. "With rapid market iteration and changing consumer demand, new product development carries significant uncertainty," he added. Using food development as an example, out of 100 new varieties, perhaps only a dozen gain distributor approval, and only a few of those are what consumers are willing to buy. Selecting market-approved products from numerous R&D candidates requires a pilot platform for trial and error, with repeated refinement and verification of formulas and process parameters.
Established in 2021 with support from the Changfeng county government, the Pilot City provides technical support for the industrial-scale production of newly developed food products. Promoting technology verification and maturation is one of its key functions. Addressing the gap between laboratory technology and mass production, the Pilot City leverages professional services to bridge the transformation shortfall. It builds standardized pilot production lines and technical labs to conduct process scaling, parameter optimization, and stability testing for deep processing technologies, driving the iterative upgrade from small-scale trials to mature industrial processes. Simultaneously, it establishes a closed-loop verification system covering formula debugging, batch trial production, quality testing, and cost accounting, creating directly implementable industrial process packages that effectively lower corporate technical trial-and-error risks. Furthermore, the Pilot City collaborates with universities, research institutes, and leading enterprises on targeted solutions for industry pain points, deepening industry-academia-research synergy, while also conducting market piloting to continuously optimize product processes based on feedback, achieving both technology maturation and market fit.
"We used Changfeng green radish, a nationally recognized geographical indication product, and through repeated pilot process trials, developed a radish and beef patty product that has been well-received by several airlines," Shi Qin said. The technical support effect of pilot platforms is becoming evident in more fields.
At the National Artificial Intelligence Application Pilot Production Base (Hefei), the platform is equipped with an "intelligent brain". Leveraging big data and AI, this base connects the medical AI chain from "scientific research and攻关—scenario trial and error—iterative upgrade—industrial落地", allowing cutting-edge technologies to leave the lab and precisely address primary healthcare pain points and real industry needs, achieving the goal of technology serving people's livelihoods and empowering industries. Built and operated by Anhui Heshu Zhiyi Technology Co., Ltd., a subsidiary of Hefei Big Data Assets Operation Co., Ltd., it is a core platform for the large-scale落地 and普惠 application of "AI + healthcare" technology in China.
Tu Ran, Chairman of Hefei Big Data Company, stated that building this base is a key抓手 for破解 bottlenecks in healthcare科技成果转化 and an important practice in implementing the national "AI+" strategy and empowering数字 Anhui construction. In terms of operation, the base innovatively established a常态化 mechanism of "government leadership, state-owned capital operation, and ecosystem共建", deeply exploring new "technology + business" integration paths, making real medical business scenarios the "practical examination ground" for AI technology落地. Relying on self-developed domestic computing infrastructure and iFlytek's Spark large model, the base built a professional medical AI application service system, launching multiple intelligent辅助 diagnosis tools. These have been deployed in 80 community health service centers, cumulatively serving over 870,000 people, conducting standardized electronic medical record quality checks over 2.54 million times, diagnosis quality checks over 1.9 million times, and rational medication quality checks over 1.29 million times.
"We are focused on破解 current challenges in the medical AI field, such as difficulty in要素保障, scenario verification, and落地 promotion, continuously shaping new advantages for医疗 AI innovation and development, and building a first-class,医研企协同 innovation ecosystem nationwide," said Han Ping, Chairman of Heshu Zhiyi.
Resource Aggregation Helps Enterprises Reduce Costs and Increase Efficiency
Pilot bases are hubs connecting laboratory original innovation with industrial-scale production. They not only provide real engineering environments, professional testing methods, and engineering experience but also lower corporate costs and investment risks by aggregating resources.
"The significance of pilot production lies in using limited investment to verify product processes, forming scalable, replicable experience to prepare for mass production," Shi Qin explained. "Although the Pilot City is not large in scale, it is fully functional, equipped with technologies and equipment for food testing,定向 enzyme hydrolysis, supercritical extraction, and低温超微 grinding. Compared to a company purchasing equipment, hiring personnel, and攻关 processes independently for new product development, using a pilot platform undoubtedly reduces development costs and cycles."
In Shi's view, the advantages of pilot bases are具体体现在 four areas. First, reducing fixed asset investment costs; companies don't need to build their own production lines, labs, or cold chain storage but can share platform equipment and space as needed, saving substantial upfront investment. Second, lowering R&D试验 costs by sharing professional equipment, technical teams, and统一 purchasing consumables,分摊 operational energy costs, and减少重复开支. Third, reducing经营 transaction costs; pilot bases create platforms for就近对接 upstream and downstream, cutting logistics and communication costs, while providing一站式 public services like申报, legal,财税, and branding, saving on outsourcing fees and time. Fourth, lowering market trial-and-error costs by verifying量产 feasibility through small-batch pilot production, avoiding losses from盲目投产.
"It is凭借 these advantages that the Pilot City has attracted leading enterprises like厨邦,楼外楼, and紫燕百味鸡 to conduct pilot R&D," Shi said. It's not just the Pilot City; many pilot platforms in Hefei are dedicated to helping companies calculate the "cost account" – getting new technologies onto production lines with shorter time and smaller costs.
Hefei Institute of Technology Innovation, Chinese Academy of Sciences (hereafter "Hefei Innovation Institute") is one of Anhui's first batch of科技成果转化 pilot bases. Focusing on the two key links of "technology incubation and enterprise incubation" in transformation, it深耕 the digital economy and life health fields, establishing a "sci-tech innovation + industry" ecosystem that tightly integrates innovation, industry, talent, capital, and service chains.
"Through pilot production, we identify and solve various potential issues products might encounter before mass production, such as design flaws, process difficulties, supply chain problems, and standards compliance, providing reliable decision-making basis for investors and managers. Practice proves that technologies verified and optimized through pilot production see significantly improved maturity, reliability, and market acceptance, making it easier to attract industrial capital, secure customer orders, and achieve a leap in technological value," said Yu Wei, Planning Department Head at Hefei Innovation Institute.
In May 2024, a company commissioned Hefei Innovation Institute to conduct pilot development research on new energy battery materials. "After verification on the pilot platform, the company's semi-solid-state battery formula and process were effectively optimized. Without the platform, the company would have spent over 30 million yuan on equipment investment; using platform services, it only paid a small equipment usage fee," Yu said.
The National AI Application Pilot Base (Hefei) also立足 providing pilot verification support for corporate R&D innovation and cost reduction/efficiency improvement. Han Ping介绍 that by integrating domestic computing resources, university research力量, and industry ecosystem resources, the base forms a development pattern of resource聚合 and优势互补,大幅 lowering the R&D threshold and industrialization costs for medical AI enterprises, providing全周期专业化保障 for technology verification, product iteration, and成果转化.
Optimizing Ecosystem and Extending Service Reach
"Pilot production is a vital link for corporate innovation成果迈向规模量产, but technical piloting alone is far from sufficient; market piloting is equally indispensable – it关系到 whether a company can grow and an industry can be successfully incubated," said Yu Zhenzhong, President of Hefei Intelligent Robot Research Institute.
Founded a decade ago, the Hefei Intelligent Robot Research Institute focuses on robotics, high-end equipment, photoelectric sensing, and other fields,深耕 high-tech innovation and科技成果转化. Shortly after its establishment, the Hefei Longyan Intelligent startup team approached it, hoping for pilot verification of their pharmaceutical automatic packaging production line.
Startups often face dual pressures of process development and market promotion simultaneously. Yu Zhenzhong recalled: "Besides helping with pilot verification and production line R&D, we also assisted them in开拓 markets. For instance, when potential customers were unsure about Longyan Intelligent's technology, the institute proactively explained its features to alleviate concerns." With the institute's support, Longyan Intelligent continuously expanded its "customer circle", successively cooperating with知名药企 like Pfizer, AstraZeneca,扬子江, and华熙生物. Today, the company's annual revenue exceeds 400 million yuan, and it has been recognized as a national-level专精特新 "little giant" enterprise.
Beyond technical and market piloting, the Hefei Intelligent Robot Research Institute also provides配套 services, acting as a "店小二" for startups. Yu told reporters that as an innovation unit of the "USTC Silicon Valley", companies registering there can enjoy Anhui's special policies for it. "For financial management, we assist with accounting and tax issues and provide management consulting services, helping companies save costs. For talent recruitment, we have cooperation agreements with universities like Hefei University of Technology, Anhui University of Science and Technology, and Hefei University, allowing startups to hire suitable graduates through pilot projects, saving effort and improving efficiency in human resources," Yu said.
"For创业 projects with good prospects after pilot verification, we also connect them with various government funds and investment institutions to help them obtain investment support," Yu added,举例说 that with the institute's help, the pipeline robot technology solution launched by Hagong Zhiling Company secured nearly 10 million yuan in investment. Currently, the company has business cooperation with entities like Hefei Economic Development Zone Public Utility Development Company, with promising market prospects.
While serving innovation and entrepreneurship, Hefei's pilot platforms themselves have also achieved significant development. Taking the Hefei Intelligent Robot Research Institute as an example, it has cumulatively introduced over 1,000 innovation and entrepreneurship talents, with annual综合收入 exceeding 1 billion yuan. It has主导 and参与制定 12 national and industry standards, undertaken over 20 national, provincial, and municipal重大科技 projects, and has grown into an "Excellent (Class A)" national-level technology business incubator, one of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology's first batch of key培育 pilot platforms, and an Anhui Provincial科技成果转化 pilot base.
Currently, Hefei has布局建设 41科技成果转化 pilot bases (platforms), with total pilot site area exceeding 520,000 square meters, total仪器设备 investment value over 1.9 billion yuan, cumulatively serving more than 3,600 enterprises, signing 16,000 pilot contracts worth over 1.85 billion yuan.
Wei Xiaofu, Director of the Hefei Science and Technology Bureau's科技成果转化 Promotion Department, told reporters that the next step involves continuing to optimize resource allocation and提升 pilot service capabilities. This includes梳理 and optimizing the industrial细分领域 layout of existing pilot bases, building intelligent service platforms依托 the "科创大脑" to intelligently match科技成果转化 projects with pilot services, avoiding homogenized competition.同时, encouraging pilot bases to开放共享检验检测 capabilities externally, constructing an integrated "small-scale trial—pilot—transformation—incubation"成果转化 ecosystem through resource complementarity and协同 innovation.
The importance of pilot platforms in promoting the深度融合 of technological innovation and industrial innovation is self-evident. Based on this, government levels have相继出台专项 policies to推动 pilot platforms做强做优. Hefei issued the "Hefei City科技成果转化 Concept Verification Center and Pilot Base Filing Management Measures" in 2025, with relevant departments also proposing rewards of up to 3 million yuan for pilot bases based on service effectiveness. Recently, the Anhui Provincial Government General Office issued the "Anhui Province Manufacturing Industry Pilot Platform Construction Implementation Plan" (hereafter "Implementation Plan"),同步配套出台 documents like the "Anhui Province Manufacturing Industry Pilot Platform Key Construction Directions".
According to this "Implementation Plan", the direction and layout for local manufacturing pilot platform construction are clear – by 2028, Anhui will培育建设 around 30 provincial-level manufacturing pilot platforms and will also strive to create national-level pilot platforms in优势产业 fields, forming a pilot service system that supports the engineering development and industrial application of manufacturing technology成果. The construction layout will紧密贴合群众生活和产业发展需求, focusing on areas like intelligent connected new energy vehicles, next-generation information technology, artificial intelligence, high-end equipment manufacturing, new energy, new materials, and生物医药, while also兼顾 future industries like quantum technology, hydrogen energy, and brain-computer interfaces, ensuring pilot platforms truly serve industrial upgrading and the improvement of people's livelihoods.